Why I Write

I write Not for praise or for achievement but because I can, and knowing that is power in a world where secrets clear as day find their only fortress in letter-speckled pages on the sturdy shelves of the educated For those whose lives are far from stable I – idealist, as it were – will expose the guilt of the system I write Not because I have all of the right words but because I have been taught how to find them, feel them, and use them to undo what is wrong For those whose only alphabet is the sounds of poverty I will drown out the noise with my keys I write Not to find my own voice and have it heard but to be the voice of those whose wings have been tied by words like Hutu and Tutsi For the powerless whose destitution is just numbers in textbooks I will live in the cluttered cities and tell the stories of their slums I write Not because I’ve seen or known it all but because words are all I know, all I need, and everything I want for the world