Imagining a better world while enduring and bearing witness to the afflictions of the current one is not easy. However, how could we ever be free if we do not first allows ourselves to imagine a world where we are? Our imagination is necessary, community is necessary, analyzing and criticizing the politics we uphold and  liberatory methods which could free us is necessary. Octavia Butler crafted a world that is a reflection of our past, present, and possibly, our future. 

Acorn was a community for anybody that needed or wanted it. It was an opportunity to have what the world has robbed so many of us of. I believe Lauren being perceived as a leader by her people, played a role in the pressure she felt to fulfill her purpose (spreading Earthseed) by any means necessary. Lauren’s daughter, Asha, provides a necessary critique of her mother that emphasize how imperative it is to not evade critiquing who and/or what we believe in, love, or respect

Octavia Butler’s Parable of The Sower exemplifies how the mind, body, and spirit will continually stretch as it strives towards liberation.