Out of Egypt we came.
Mitzrayim.
Mitzrayim literally means
Narrow place.
We have come from narrow places forever
Jews have.
Minorities have.
We have come from wombs
We have come narrow passages
From doors of no return
From binaries that do not fit us.
Egypt we overcame.
Mitzrayim.
Egypt literally means
Black.
We have come from dark places forever
Jews have
Minorities have.
We have come from wombs
We have come from middle passages
From the depths of the South
From misgendering and murder.
Out of Egypt we came.
And now
It is as if we were sent back.
G-d did not part the seas this time
He did not speak to Moses
We thought we heard Him through Upshot
And Nate Silver
And everyone who consoled their friends
Their loved ones
The Jews
The minorities
That the sea would part, once more.
But it hasn't.
And while the Jews spent over 500 years in bondage
We must endure four more.
We must overcome.
And they marched and said
We will overcome.
We must march and hold each other up
Because some of us have fallen when the weight of it all became too much.
And as I sat bleary-eyed, sleepless, in the warm presence of dejected journalists
I thought to myself
We will overcome.
And when I saw the sunrise on the new world
A world that was full of hope when I entered my safe haven of journalistics and liberals and love
I remembered that
If we came out of Egypt
Mitzrayim
We can do it again
Jews can
Minorities can
Because we have come out of narrow places forever.
Jews have.
Minorities have.
We have come from wombs
We have come narrow passages
From doors of no return
From binaries that do not fit us.
Egypt we overcame.
And Egypt we will overcome.
For it is narrow now
But we will break through the walls
The wombs
The narrow passages
The binaries that don't fit us
Mitzrayim
Arm in arm.
Together.
Because out of Egypt we came
And out of Egypt we will come
Sophie Mann grew up in Palo Alto, California surrounded by love and trees good for climbing. She has a Bachelor’s in English and psychology from Northwestern University and a Master’s in learning sciences from Harvard University. She currently lives by Lake Michigan.