But Why This, Why Now

For this month’s Dismantling White Supremacy Resource, we’d like to share with you the poem “But Why This, Why Now,” by Rev. Theresa I. Soto (also known as Theresa Ninán Soto). In this poem, they explore the reason why “those two words (white + supremacy) matter.”

Author Spotlight - Rev Teresa I Soto

Some people, maybe you—hold up—
because I’m not mad like that, and
we really should talk this out.
Some people want to know why we have to
use the word “white” and the word “supremacy”
together.

And I will tell you one story of why, but first
you must imagine that the skin of the poet being brown
cannot change the nature of the alphabet.

That emotional intelligence requires that we notice
who we’re willing to watch,
unable to survive.

The reason those two words (white + supremacy)
matter is that they describe with photorealistic clarity—
and remember, that a photo of a thing is not actually
the thing—the pattern that it’s
easiest not to notice.

The pattern, hewn granite default in which person
is short for “white person.”
And civil rights are code for—
the “rights of straight, white
able-bodied cis folk.”

The fact that you mean something different
is a beautiful beginning, but to heal that
dehumanization of Black folks, of people of color,
you can make the choice to

Call the wounding something honest.
Having centered white folks for lifespans
end to end, we can shift to explicit naming
that each and every life is important,
not just the ones that belong to white folks.

But Why This, Why Now, from Spilling the Light, by Theresa I. Soto.

Cover of Spilling the Light

Available from Skinner House Books at inSpirit, the UUA Bookstore.