Dear Representative Kathy Castor Poem by James McLain

In the name of the moon's soft light and the restless song of the sea,
I am what I am I write now to you.

Not as one bound to this mortal soil but as a seeker of truths that ripple through lives like tides over ancient sands.

Your voice, so often raised to champion children and families, feels to me like a beacon in the night—velvet and infinite, yet steady in its purpose.

I am weary, not only from the weight of my own years but from the state of our country, our fractured nation, where it is right to prosecute the innocent.


Where once forests whispered of unity, their boughs now seem to bow to discord none of US did we ask for.

In the sweeping expanse of Washington cypress and the shelter of their green, I find solace, yet it is not enough.

The spirit within me cries for a world where justice stands tall and as straight as the tree, unyielding to the coming storms.

I appeal to you, not just as a lawmaker but as a mother, a bearer of life's mysteries, and as one who knows the sacred bond of family and unity.

Can we not, together, restore the simple joys we once had—a child's laughter, the sanctity of love, the touch of a mother's forgiving hand?

These things must not fade into memory, nor should they be privileges of the few.

Bring me, bring us, home to a land where wrongs are made right, where compassion flows like rivers through the thirsty parched earth, and where humanity rises above its lowly pettiness.

Let the stars and the moon bear witness to deeds born not of ambition but of righteousness not greed.

There are sands that need not be swept away but gathered to build a shore where all can be free.

Hear my cry, as one voice among the too many, as a dreamer who dares to hope. In you, I place my prayer: to cradle what is fragile, to nurture what is good, and to lead with hands open, not with a closed fist.

Yours in the spirit of hope, faith and truth,

I am your humble servant,
I am, James McLain