Leonard Peltier, the brilliant and prolific artist who painted this self-portrait and has been behind enemy lines since 1976, is, like Mumia, beloved worldwide.

Perhaps it is destiny that we would find ourselves incarcerated so near, under similar circumstance, by similar forces, using similar excuses, for a similar love of our people.

Perhaps it is destiny that we arrived at a similar truth – that we had to stand in opposition to a similar oppression.

Perhaps it was destiny that we were unable to stand idly by with similar brutality all around us, and similar violence thrust upon us, as the only means to survive.

Given the choice of lying down to die or standing up to live, we chose to live. Standing up and living is our only crime in this, the land of the free and home of the brave. Our dream is still alive and, as hunger striker Bobby Sands once said, you can lock up the dreamer but you cannot place chains around an idea.

While acknowledging another setback for Mumia in the lack of a new trial, I am hopeful for the new sentencing hearing on April 19. Like so many before us, our smaller victories will one day result in our ultimate triumph, and we will carry on the Struggle until that day.

For we are one, and we are many. We are forever, we are timeless. We are Crazy Horse, we are Geronimo, we are Mumia, we are Leonard Peltier, we are Malcolm X and we are Martin Luther King. We are the voice of justice and natural living. We are the American Indian Movement, we are the Black Panthers, we are MOVE, we are the Viet Cong, we are the Irish Republican Army and the Palestinian Liberation Organization.

We are every man, woman and child who desires to see a sunrise in a land of freedom and opportunity, a land of plenty and not hunger, a land of choices without fear, a land of progress without brutality. We are not only the citizens of Belfast and Pine Ridge, Philadelphia and Gaza. We are children of Earth, a place worth living in and not just surviving in. A place where every life, no matter if it is wrapped in brown skin or black, red skin or yellow, white skin or any color skin, is precious to our God and to each other.

I pray and I live for the day that we meet as free men and embrace each other in our own communities, with our families and the world as witness to our liberation and our triumph. For make no mistake: The world is watching, and our children are learning. And every slight, every insult, every injustice, every bruise, every injury, every lost battle, every second behind bars will be redeemed in the colorblind laughter of our children. Theirs is the future that we struggle for and why we will never stop speaking the truth.

Free Mumia!

In the Spirit of Crazy Horse, Leonard Peltier – Lakota, Anishinabe

Free Leonard Peltier as well ... because it is the RIGHT thing to do. Visit Friends of Peltier at www.FreePeltierNow.org.

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