Our racial suffering
is deep and wide.

It is a particular
kind of samsara.
Repeated cycles
of bitterness, pain,
and fear.

It is sustained
by our conditioning,
both individual
and collective.

It is the undercurrent
of a failed paradigm
of aggression, ownership
of peoples, and
enduring institutionalized racism.

This failed paradigm
of views presents us
with a profound opportunity
to rebuild the shape
of our thinking, speech, and
action as we can
and must redefine
what it means to be a human being.

- Larry Ward