The Universal Zulu Nation stands to acknowledge wisdom

Host: The city was alive that night — pulsing, breathing, glowing like a living heartbeat wrapped in electric skin. Graffiti glimmered on old brick walls, colors colliding in wild symphony beneath the hum of flickering streetlights. The bass of a distant beat rolled through the air like thunder with rhythm — a rhythm older than pain, deeper than words.

Under an overpass painted with murals of fists, halos, and broken chains, two figures stood: Jack — tall, lean, his sharp face shadowed by the brim of a worn cap — and Jeeny, wrapped in a long denim jacket, her dark eyes shimmering in the neon twilight.

A mural loomed behind them: the words “Universal Zulu Nation” stretched across it in gold. Above the letters, faces — Black, brown, white, old, young — all rising toward a single burning sun.

Jeeny: “It’s more than art, you know.”

Jack: “I know.”

Jeeny: “Afrika Bambaataa wasn’t just talking about hip-hop. He was talking about humanity. Wisdom, unity, equality — all stitched together in one beat.”

Jack: “Sure,” he said, his voice low and gravelly. “But people talk about unity all the time. Words are easy when you’ve got a mic and an audience.”

Jeeny: “Words start the revolution, Jack. The beat just carries it.”

Host: The wind shifted, carrying the scent of asphalt and rain. A group of kids ran past, laughing, their sneakers pounding the pavement like a call-and-response. Somewhere close, someone turned up the volume on a portable speaker. A familiar rhythm pulsed — deep, ancestral.

Jeeny turned toward the mural, tracing her fingers over the painted sun.

Jeeny: “He said, ‘The Universal Zulu Nation stands to acknowledge wisdom, understanding, freedom, justice, and equality, peace, unity, love, and having fun…’ Tell me that isn’t poetry. Tell me that isn’t gospel in sneakers.”

Jack: “It’s idealism.”

Jeeny: “It’s truth.”

Jack: “Truth?” He laughed — not cruelly, but tiredly. “You really think the world runs on wisdom and unity? Look around. Corruption, greed, division — that’s the real anthem now.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe that’s why people like Bambaataa made their own song. You fight darkness with rhythm. You don’t drown — you dance.”

Host: Her words glowed in the air like neon, soft yet unbreakable. Jack shoved his hands into his jacket pockets, staring at the mural. The gold paint seemed to shimmer, alive with stories he couldn’t name.

Jack: “So you think music can fix the world?”

Jeeny: “Not fix it. Heal it. Music doesn’t erase pain — it teaches us how to survive it.”

Jack: “That’s poetic, Jeeny, but the world needs more than beats and lyrics.”

Jeeny: “And yet, the right beat has stopped wars in hearts that bullets never could.”

Host: The rain began, slow at first, each drop pattering against metal and concrete like syncopated percussion. Neither of them moved. The city around them shimmered — reflections rippling in puddles, lights bending through water.

Jack: “You know what I hear when I listen to those old Zulu Nation records?”

Jeeny: “What?”

Jack: “Hope with a backbeat. But hope doesn’t pay the rent.”

Jeeny: “Maybe not. But it pays the soul. The problem is, you keep measuring worth in what you can count — money, power, survival. The Zulu Nation measured worth in what you can feel — wisdom, equality, peace.”

Jack: “Peace doesn’t fill empty stomachs.”

Jeeny: “No. But it teaches people not to starve others.”

Host: Her words cut the night open like quiet lightning. Jack looked at her, eyes narrowing — not in anger, but in recognition. Something in her faith shook the edges of his disbelief.

Jeeny: “They stood for balance — faith and facts, science and spirit. That’s the beauty of it, Jack. It wasn’t religion — it was revelation. Whether you call Him Allah, Jehovah, Yahweh, or Jah — they were saying: We are one.”

Jack: “Sounds naïve.”

Jeeny: “No. It’s revolutionary. In a world that builds walls, calling yourself one with everyone else is the most radical thing you can do.”

Host: A train rumbled overhead, the roar filling the space like thunder, shaking the concrete beneath their feet. The lights flickered — one heartbeat, one flash — then steadied again.

Jack’s voice softened.

Jack: “You think they believed it could last? That unity could survive fame, money, politics?”

Jeeny: “They knew it wouldn’t be easy. But they also knew something bigger — that ideas outlive people. You can’t kill rhythm, Jack. It finds a way to return, even when you bury it.”

Host: The music in the distance changed — an old-school beat rising, pulsing through puddles and walls alike. Someone shouted, “Peace, love, unity, and having fun!” and laughter followed.

Jack: “That line — ‘overcoming the negative through the positive.’ You really believe that?”

Jeeny: “Completely.”

Jack: “Even after everything you’ve seen?”

Jeeny: “Especially after everything I’ve seen. That’s when it matters most. You can’t overcome hate by hating it. You overcome it by outshining it.”

Host: The rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun, leaving the street glistening beneath the lamplight — the city’s pulse steady again.

Jack crouched down, touching the edge of the mural, his fingers brushing the chipped paint of a golden halo.

Jack: “You ever notice,” he said quietly, “that every revolution begins with someone painting on a wall?”

Jeeny: “Because walls remember longer than people.”

Jack: “You think this city listens?”

Jeeny: “It doesn’t have to. We do.”

Host: Silence fell, thick but gentle — the kind that hums with thought. Jeeny’s eyes found his, steady and calm.

Jeeny: “The Zulu Nation wasn’t just about music. It was a blueprint for the soul. Wisdom for the mind, rhythm for the heart, justice for the world.”

Jack: “And fun?”

Jeeny: (smiling) “Fun reminds us we’re still alive.”

Host: He smiled then — a small, rare thing, breaking through the stone of his skepticism. The camera would linger there: the mural behind them glowing faintly under the wet light, the street breathing quiet peace, two figures bound by a conversation that felt bigger than the world.

Jeeny: “Maybe unity starts small. One rhythm. One word. One heart refusing to divide.”

Jack: “And one skeptic willing to listen.”

Host: The music swelled again — the echoes of hip-hop’s golden past mingling with the pulse of the present. The mural shimmered, gold against the wet dark.

Host: And as the night closed in around them, the city whispered the creed of its own rebirth —

That wisdom is a bridge,
Faith a rhythm,
Science a verse,
and Love the everlasting beat.

The Universal Zulu Nation stood — and still stands — not as a monument of music,
but as a mirror for the soul.

For in every rhythm that unites us,
there is God,
by any name,
and in every beat that heals,
there is freedom.