For almost a year, I’ve been contemplating launching a podcast. I won’t bore you with all the specifics, but given my role, the idea of producing a podcast—particularly one that could stir controversy—makes me apprehensive.

As an educator, a profession currently under intense scrutiny, I feel the weight of this decision. Rather than diving into planning and scripting podcast episodes, I’ve been tinkering with this poem that explores the fear and hesitation of “speaking out” in a world already brimming with noise and, at times, irritable chaos.

I didn’t write what follows today, but I spent some time refining and polishing it. It’s the result of several months and numerous revisions. I hope you find it enjoyable and perhaps even relatable.

A Voice Through the Thunder

The air is thick with murmurs,

whispers swirl like angry rip tides—
Yet, I am compelled to break through

the silence of uncertainty,

the weight of an audience's heavy gaze.

I am a figure, a shadow cast wide—

Deep within me, I feel the wild pulse of truth; 
It beats like war drums in my chest,

but how the words struggle to rise,

caught in the storm of public eyes.

How can one speak when the earth trembles beneath?

When the winds of doubt blow hard and fierce?

When to speak is to risk a thousand slings,

a thousand arrows, sharp and unyielding?

The heart flinches from the threat,

Still, it yearns to rise, to declare its worth.

What is it to stand as a figure,

under the weight of unspoken expectations?

To know that every syllable, every breath,

could spark the fire of scorn or praise,

could tear the veil of comfortable lies,

or turn the gathered crowd against you.

The heart strains, seeking a balance

between truth and peace,

between the soul’s cry and the public's need.

And still, its voice calls, though shaken.
For what is silence but surrender?

And what is a public figure if not one

to bear the truth, come what may?

The struggle is not in the words—

It is in the stillness before the conflict,

in the knowledge that to speak is to fight,

to sever the silence of the crowd,

to rip through the clamoring noise with the sound

of what is real, what must be heard,

even when the weight of the world bears down.

So let the words come—

Let them flow like a river in flood season.
For though the stones may rise to meet it,

the river will carve its path,

And the truth shall find its place—

In spite of the cost.

In spite of the thunder that follows.