An ode to Lilly Wilson

A performance poet, Taylor Mali, once wrote a poem Called \"Like Lilly Like Wilson\". In that poem, he describes a recovering \"like addict\" and a poem that could change the world. If you don\'t understand this, read the poem, which is here: http://www.taylormali.com/index.cfm?webid=15
Here we go.

I remember once
Taylor Mali told us
He was writing the poem
That would change the world
So my gears got to their
Rusty spinning that they do sometimes
I got to thinking, how would that go?
Would it be a name dropping contest?
Would it be all about rhyming like Regie,
Loving like Shane, dreaming and smiling
Like Buddy� (Etc)
Or maybe, it would be to someone
Like a love letter, or a terrorist attack
Or maybe, it would be for someone
Like the invisible children in Uganda
Or the invisible children in Chicago
Maybe to the children who open their
Wrists like letters hoping that the
Words that will define them will pour out
Or the kids who know their own voices
So well that they just smile because
They know that they can make it through.
Perhaps it would be to the poets
Trying to write that poem, as inspiration.
Or maybe it was to the kids who
Are so unsure of who they are, they feel
It would be easier to define themselves
With an event, Like Columbine, or
A poetry slam.
Maybe instead it was about someone
Like a president, or a dictator, or a writer
Maybe it was about Shakespeare or
Washington or Hitler.
Perhaps it was about a child like
Me or Lillie Wilson who
Without the word �like� and with a
Mind that adapts and changes, could save
Us from our self detonation
Or maybe it was not about people
It could have been about an idea
A man made contraption to fix
The leak in the Titanic of life
Or at least, move the iceberg
Maybe it was about love
And how it is the defroster of
Far too many hearts and souls
Or time,
And how the second hands should
Burn in hell
Or purpose,
The meaning of life that has actual resonance,
A sound that vibrates the strings in the harps
Of gods
Wait, maybe it was sound
Like the sound of a tree falling
With no one there
Like the sounds of a country praying for aid
Similar to the streets of this very city
Where those forgotten scream
Up from the hole they awoke in
Or maybe like the prayers of 6 billion people
In 6 billion religions with
6 billion different gods
All striving for peace�
Peace could be it!
It can change things in beautiful ways
That nothing else except silence can.
Whatever it was
I am overjoyed that like Lillie
Like Wilson like interrupted him
Because no one cares about a story
Even a phenomenal, life shattering
World changing story
If they already know how it ends.
So thank you Lillie Wilson
You may have saved us all
Or at least
Changed us.