Why plant hope?

When there is hope, there is a future. - Tambra Raye Hill Stevenson

With the surge of violence sweeping across our communities, one must raise the question of what are they doing about it. Violence doesn't happen on it's on...it represent a sympton of root shock (as written by Dr. Mindi Fullilove of Columbia University). Traumatic events like issues surrounding Hurricane Katrina and personally the death of my father may trigger elevated stress and impeding progress on a personal and community level if one allows. I choose hope. I choose to plant hope in me, family and community.

Violence (including that which is self-inflicted) is merely an outward expression of the lack of love within (one's self). Through my family, faith and God within my soul, I know I am loved; consequently violence doesn't win. Love truly can concur all. This discovery didn't happen over night. It took countless hours of meditation, journaling, spending time with family, self, reading and creating art and thinking about the world around and my internal world.

That's why I wrote the poem, Plant Hope. to use the earth elements (soil, flowers, watering, etc) as metaphors to cultivating the hope, faith, love, joy and peace within and from the soul (soil) love and hope can grow reaching wide and high into the community ultimately impacting positively all those who come near to the plant called HOPE.

What is root shock?

Root shock is the traumatic stress reaction to the destruction of all or part of one’s emotional ecosystem. This metaphor is taken from botany. Plants suffer from root shock when they are relocated from one place to another. The loss of the familiar soil–with its particular texture and balance of nutrients–and the inevitable damage to the root system cause the plant injury or early death.