What was it about Bob Marley?

I awoke humming By the Rivers of Babylon and remembering Bob Marley made me smile. I think that Bob, like Martin Luther King, like Gandhi, like Jesus Christ, was an outstanding revolutionary whom history has tried to make into a warm fuzzy nice guy. Why do we do this? Somehow we are blessed with great visionaries incarnating and somehow they are recognized in their lives as something very special, very out of the ordinary, and they inspire real followers. But, after they die, as in Bob's case, or are assassinated, in the case of many, time passes and they somehow get turned into white bread. Nice, sweet people who tried to be nice.

If you listen to Bob, to Christ, to King, they were hoping to turn over the established order of things and inspire revolution. I am a pacifist, and yet I am still inspired by Che. Bob was inspired by Che and the Black Panthers and others who aren't remembered for being good background music in tropical bars. I guess one of the things that unites these souls was their ability to speak Truth to Power. Another thing is that they were the voice of those who didn't have a voice. They seemed to have an innate understanding of the dignity of all people.

Sometimes, I find myself thinking snobbish thoughts. Sometimes I have a reverse snobbery. I want to get it right in this lifetime. I want to see that we are all perfect in God's eyes. I want to get my ego out of my way and my little miseries out of my way and radiate hope to the hopeless. I need to use my time and seek refuge in the Dalai Lama and bring his love and compassion to all whom I encounter. I wish I could sing.

There is this little couple here in Granada who sing at your table in cafes and she really can't sing that well. But when she sings "Nicaragua, Nicaragua", I cry every time. I cry because through her voice comes a vision of the hopes and dreams and yearnings that made the Sandanista Revolution possible here. For me, that is.

Parsing down what I am trying to get at, I hear the word 'hope'. Maybe that is what I feel when I wake up humming By the Rivers of Babylon.