Toto

Chrycka Harper, Poet & Literary CriticLast Modified: 02:10 a.m. DST, 17 December 2013

Toto, Toto Where am I? I don't think we're in Kansas anymore. My footsteps lead us here: But what is here? I heard we are at the Mecca But our leader is leaving and creativity has gone missing.

I heard we are in the Nation's capital, but the government is shut down, Obamacare is supposedly around, and everything seems upside down. It's all a rhythm that I am not familiar with.

Toto, Toto I don't know what to think. We never saw so many shades of brown adorned with different expressions of what it means to be brown. Yet verses of ghetto anecdotes flow from boys' mouths like scriptures.

Versace, Versace, Versace, they can click their heels three times and they still can't afford it or even spell it. But when I quote the Lord is my shepherd and everlasting collective love, they act like they can't even see the picture.

Women waddling around, bobbing heads arms tied behind their backs only to get so far. Multicolored lips, hair, and shoes yet their minds still live in black and white.

It's like they forgot about Lauryen Hill's doo wop doo wop That thing in which we cannot speak But their tongues are so familiar with. Children running in circles But missing out on the circle of life. One down then its on to the next one. I thought that we would give our soldiers the best weapons for war, But instead they get guns.

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Published: 17 December 2013 (Page 2 of 2)

No child left behind But they fly under radar All the time Success after success of missing land mines and traps until when? Until they reach enemy territory then what?

Battles exchange, victories are won Then our children come home But they still don't know how to wade in the water. Help can barely exit their mouths so they try to wade and do what society says.

We tell them to disregard their fantasy, but we continue to imagine our reality. The true reality is that these souls try to operate in the zone in which they are comfortable at dawn, but it still remains at twilight. To the point where event the doctors, lawyers, and police can't save lives But rather push the waves to their demise.

A demise that so happened to be at Columbine. Newton. The Navy Yard. Miles away from where my footsteps leave off...

Toto, Toto I know we're not in Kansas anymore. Kansas had yellow green grass and rolling flatlands going nowhere. We never fit in and never would.

But I know when my true home Have been removed from its village. Now the only thing I see is A sky without a sun. This is what happens when people Don't listen to history. Instead They play the same songs.

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Somali women want a say in government

Somali woman petitions for a greater role in the new government.

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Zimbabwean Jews Confirmed via DNA

Lemba Jews (Israelites) SA Malawi ZImbabwe Mozambique Israel, Photo by Phantom

ZIMBABWE - Tudor Parfitt's remarkable journey to introduce the Lemba tribe to the world began with a lecture in South Africa on the Jews of Ethiopia. After meeting with the tribe, observing their lives and listening to their oral history, he returned to England where he determined that "this would be a wonderful research project."

Thus began an intense relationship with the Lemba during which he lived with them, gained their acceptance and respect, and was finally able to secure their agreement to DNA testing.

Parfitt's scientific research generated a great amount of interest in this group of sub-Saharan Africans who claimed they are Jewish. Josh Bernstein, noted explorer, archeologist and Jew, decided to retrace the amazing journey that may have resulted in the Lemba settling in Zimbabwe.  During Josh's peregrinations he decided to try to decipher the reality between myth and fact regarding the Biblical Lost Tribes of Israel.

Josh encountered many groups around the world who claimed either direct or peripheral descent from the Biblical Jews.  However, it was the Lemba Tribe aka Lembaa, who live in Zimbabwe, Southern Africa,  who proved to be the most intriguing encounter in this quest.

Like the Bene Israel and Cochin Jews of India, the Lemba people did not fit neatly into most peoples' perceptions of "what Jews look like." Aspreviously discussed in this blog, the Jewish diaspora is as varied as the peoples of the earth.  However, in addition to anti-Semitism, racism plays a large part of the discomfort people have with the concept of Jews of Color. The identification of the Lemba as Jews would have probably passed largely unnoticed except for their sub-Saharan ancestry.

Today news sources around the world are loudly proclaiming and tacitly conferring upon the Lemba recognition of their heritage as direct descendants of Abraham because of the efficacy of DNA testing.  It is particularly poignant for me because this news was widely publicized in Israel via The Jerusalem Post, which I hope will begin to ameliorate some of the difficulties faced by Jews of Color in Israel.  Ethiopians in particular and others in general.

For me and other 'People of the Book,'  it is always satisfying when science lends credence to our beliefs.  It was prophesied to Abraham by G-d nearly three millennium ago in Bereshit 22:17 ~ "That in blessing I will bless you, and in multiplying I will multiply your seed as the stars of the heaven, as the sand which is upon the sea-shore."

• Zimbabwe's Black Jews (FailedMessiah.com)

• Lemba Tribe in Southern Africa Has Jewish Roots Genetic Tests Reveal (World Jewish Congress)