The New York City March for Bernie! When have you ever seen the American people hold a non-campaign-affiliated march for a presidential candidate?

On a tiny little rock, spinning round an inconsequential galaxy, dwell millions of life forms, including one rather odd primate species who has been extraordinarily busy producing smoke, war, and an overwhelming amount of stuff.

Long have these creatures suffered on their miniscule chunk of land — manipulating, extorting, murdering, and oppressing one another at highly alarming rates.

Many empires have they created, from the Incan to the British, the Russian to the Qing, the French to the Roman, the Spanish to the Ottoman, constantly leveling poverty, hunger, discrimination, and abuse against their fellow (as they sometimes call themselves) “hoo-mans.”

On this Lilliputian planet, struggling masses and massive concentrations of wealth puncture every century and every continent: gold palaces against starving children, decadent churches against sick and broken bodies, gleaming mansions against impoverished families.

On and on they go, round and round, millions of creatures crying and dying, a few greedy, grubby hands grabbing food from the mouths of the rest, chasing a yellow sun in circles, the whole miserable circus hurtling about a milky galaxy, tumbling through the universe in despair and unhappiness.

Poor, tragic humans.

Little do they know — they do not have to live this way.

No longer must they live as their fellow animals, in the wild, competing, fighting, murdering. They can live in true peace and safety now, with freedom and prosperity.

They’ve popped off their planet and gone to their moon; they’ve created a technology that allows them to almost instantaneously send messages to the other side of their little rock; they’ve organized to build towering buildings and blast their way through mountains; they’ve constructed devices that allow them to fly through the air and soar across the seas; they’ve manufactured cures to a myriad of Earth diseases and instruments to cut open living bodies, fix what is wrong inside, and then stitch them back together; they’ve produced heaps of energy to fuel their sometimes bizarre, sometimes cruel endeavors and worked together to unravel a half a scrap of truth about the workings of the universe.

So much power to manipulate, change, and control their surroundings lies within the brains and bodies of these oddly bare-skinned beasts — yet poverty, hunger, suffering, abounds among them.

Rather odd, isn’t it?

Terribly sad, too.

These creatures could live in such nonviolence and accord, peace and unity — even happiness, if you can possibly imagine that, with the capabilities they now hold.

They don’t have to be working so furiously just to survive anymore. They can slow down, organize their world, take care of everyone, make sure all their babies are born into equality, tighten up and instill justice into the public-organizer called government, use their mighty power to provide and care for all their people, and live the life that they profess to believe in.

They don’t have to fight over food or land, not anymore; they can share and organize and live in peace.

Even more tragic is that such a world, a place of fairness and justice, is how they want to live.

It’s why they follow, admire, and idolize individual humans who espoused or represent all these ideas — Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King Jr., Jesus Christ, Buddha — and they even teach them to their children — share, play nice, don’t hurt anyone, treat others how you want to be treated — but they do not truly embody them.

Poor, tragic humans.

These creatures hold such great ability to alter and morph their Earth and their own lives, to organize and execute massive projects, to pour thought and brainpower together for a common purpose — if wielded for the good of the people, this power could be used to create a thriving, prosperous society.

So easy would it be for these little ones to provide an empowering, creativity-fostering, question-encouraging education to all their young, causing a ripple effect of enlightened, able citizenry who contribute novel ideas, sustainable businesses, taxes, skilled labor, strong leadership, and consumption of other people’s goods, feeding into the “my income is your spending, and your income is my spending” poor, lower- and middle-class neighborhood loop that is the engine of a bustling economy.

So simple would it be for them to create a system that cares for all their broken-bodied, sickened citizens; to create a justice system that truly serves justice; to begin to heal the bloody, horrific reality wrought upon Native, Black, Brown, Hispanic, and Latina/o people; to bring about equality for women; to protect the living lands and seas and forests from destruction.

But instead, resources better put towards the greater good are lost on tax loopholes for the already wealthy, tax cuts for the powerful, and welfare for rich corporations.

So it goes on this insignificant chunk of land, as it has for millennia, the rich growing plump while the poor grow thin, a better world sitting just beyond the horizon—

And it is here I find myself born.

It is in this world, on this rock, in this year of 2016 that I hear—

Revolution! The cry of my fellow citizens rings from green valley to vast plain, towering mountain to glistening lake, windy desert to emerald forest — my people have been rising up after the Great Recession, in Occupy Wall Street, in Black Lives Matter, in the Fight For $15, the same exact movement for equality and justice, the same desperate, angry push for freedom and justice, the same fight for equality and liberty.

Bernie Sanders! A presidential candidate not seen before in my lifetime, a man of the people, by the people, for the people, with a long, passionate history of standing up for the people and of speaking the truth about this corrupt oligarchy—

From calling for someone to “have the guts” to fight against the rich and for the poor in 1988, to attacking our corporate, unjust government in 1989, to condemning the Crime Bill in 1991, to explaining the real reasons for poverty and crime to the House in 1994, to standing up for the rights and dignity of gay soldiers in 1995, to telling the truth about crony capitalism and predicting the ‘07 Crash in 1998, to cautioning against the Iraq War in 2002, to confronting Alan Greenspan in 2003, to again protesting the never-ending war on the poor by the rich in 2010, and, now, to being that gutsy person he called for in 1988 and running for president in 2015, Bernie Sanders has never faltered in his fight for justice.

He has battled in Congress to pass amendment after amendment helping the American people, fought to aid the hurting citizens of this country.

And now the people’s Revolutions and Bernie Sanders are merging, forming one, mighty movement to overthrow this oligarchy and institute true leaders in Congress who will actually represent the people.

Enough is enough, millions of citizens cry from coast to coast, border to border!

Our people are incarcerated, impoverished, hungry, sick, oppressed, abused, and dying!

Our workforce labors for pittance and pennies; our children attend unfairly funded schools; the wealthy grow richer while the poor suffer!

Our Congress, tasked with representing and voicing the desires of the people, of the majority, of the poor, the sick, the ill, and the oppressed, is full of white, male, Christian millionaires, and owned by corporations.

We are in dire need of a change, of great leadership, of a bold individual who will stand strong beside us in the White House as we storm our legislatures with phone calls, letters, and petitions! A president who calls upon the people to stand forth, to fight! The citizens, rallying together to force this government to work for us all!

As always, the naysayers cry what has been cried for decades: Such a world of fairness and justice will never work! We must plod along in unhappiness and despair! This government that we have created is now completely unchangeable and immovable! Can I get a self-defeatist amen?!

My people are shoving aside this rhetoric, this way of thinking, and realizing how easily we can take control, take hold of our own government, our own lives, our own planet Earth, and morph this land into one that uses its economic resources efficiently and judiciously, use our great power and endless organizational abilities to create a society that thrives, blossoms with justice and prosperity for all!

Let the truth be known — the only reason the status quo exists is because someone is profiting from it. Poverty and hunger are not innate, they were created by human decisions, by human hands—

And human hands can undo them.

When millions stand together, we win. It is as overwhelmingly simple and impossibly difficult as that.

Now, I add my voice to that noble cry, that cry which has raged for millennia: Liberty, justice, freedom for all! Equality for the children, care for the sick, fairness for the imprisoned, righteousness for the oppressed!

Revolution!

Let us live our pointless, meaningless, absurd lives here on this chunk of rock in peace and prosperity!

Let us destroy the notions of what is and what is not possible!

Let us vote for Bernie Sanders, the man who is asking us to fight alongside him for a better world, a happier world, a free world!

Let us purge our societies of economic pressure and fear of not being able to pay bills! Let us empower every individual with an education so they can make a living for themselves! Let us treat every worker well, for no one who works should be living in poverty or economic struggle!

Let us transform our little piece of land on a little planet to work for ALL people, instead of just the wealthy, powerful few!

Bring forth a new era of justice, of revolution, of freedom!

Do not blow this chance, America!

Destroy this oligarchy.