Abolition by Taina Asili

Abolition for our full humanity
Build new visions of accountability
An invitation to address our needs,
repair communities, create new possibilities

Imagine what would happen if we did divest
From the systems that have kept us so oppressed
Imagine just what we would manifest,
reclaim our resources and the power we possess

Invest in education for our youth
Health care, housing, employment, healthy food
Address the harm by reaching to the roots
New structures we’ll produce, without using the master’s tools

Dismantling all that disrupts our right to thrive
Devise a plan so we can do more than survive
And with this courage we will organize

Chorus:
We call for abolition
Cause we know police and prisons
Were made with a single mission
A racist, oppressive system
So, we work for abolition
Cause we walk in the tradition
Of those who carried a vision
To take us to liberation
So we work for abolition
Abolition x4
We work for abolition

Freedom is a journey, it is not a sprint
This is a process, not a just single event
And we know we must also look within
as we build a transformative justice movement

And as we practice a new path will emerge
Cycles of violence and harm that we will purge
A commitment to healing will be heard,
love and the people’s power will converge

To bring an era that goes beyond reform
Allows new radical thinking to be born
As we tear down the bars and the borders,
fearless foundations of freedom will form

Oppressive systems we undermine
Look at the flame and follow its light
An abolitionist journey we ignite

Chorus:
We call for abolition
Cause we know police and prisons
Were made with a single mission
A racist, oppressive system
So, we work for abolition
Cause we walk in the tradition
Of those who carried a vision
To take us to liberation
So we work for abolition
Abolition x4
We work for abolition

For the ones who are locked up inside
the loved ones who fight for their lives
Black lives criminalized
children stuck in the pipeline
families caged at the border
Native struggle to fight for our water
Stolen mothers and daughters
Trans lives targets of torture
For the forebears who planted seeds
Fought and marched so we could be free
Whose descendants knelt down on one knee
For the masses who filled the streets
For the brave ones who broke away
Reclaimed their power, visioned a new day
For the next generation to say

Chorus:
We call for abolition
Cause we know police and prisons
Were made with a single mission
A racist, oppressive system
So, we work for abolition
Cause we walk in the tradition
Of those who carried a vision
To take us to liberation
So we work for abolition
Abolition x4
We work for abolition

• Abolition
• BLM
• Black Lives Matter
• Latin
• Mass Incarceration
• Police Brutality
• Reggae
• Rock
• World
• World Fusion
• Albany