In the past year I have received so many poems and thoughts--exquisite commentaries on our condition, individually and collectively. I am deeply ashamed that I have not previously published these for all of you. As always, my timing is terrible. I so apologize. Many of these incredible writers are even my friends. It was just inexcusable on my part. But just wait until you read the following masterpieces...(oh my gosh; I cannot wait to complete our basement so that, perhaps--God willing--some of these wonderful artists may indeed deign to favor us with SHARING their works here in this serene and beautiful location. Whad'ya think??)
Read on, my little grasshoppers.........
REGARDING THE FLAG
by Paticia Fiske
A flag is just a rag
unless it stands for the truth.
If mindless atrocities are performed in it’s name,
how can we defame
a symbol now harboring hate?
When it’s flown by those who approve of this war,
war based on lies fed to a captive press.
flown by those too lazy to think for themselves
beyond mass media messages.
A flag is just a rag
When politicos, defending harmful policies,
hide behind it’s colors,
When warmongers fly it as a symbol
that they have a monopoly on patriotism.
When gas-guzzlers make vulgar displays
of stars and stripes next to rifles,
When it is used to gag protesters
who disagree with the powers that be.
A flag is just a rag
when it’s hated by the world
which sees it fronting a powerful, greedy bully,
unmindful of other Nation’s rights;
when it is flown over war-ravaged sites
dripping with oil and corporate interests.
When victor ignores needs of the vanquished
to pursue phantom weapon excuses for war.
the world is watching, waiting.
A flag is just a rag
until it stands for something great.
I can’t wait until ‘Old Glory’ is unfurled,
in a world where we honor others,
for we are all sisters and brothers.
That day will come again and I can’t wait,
for our country to wake up,
and once again stand for Peace in the world,
when our flag is more than
just a rag.
--copyright ©P.
Fiske
July 2003
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The War on Evil
When president Leafy W. Vegetation took the podium
most people snickered because he looked like a twelve
year old kid. But Leafy didn’t notice, he was too
arrogant, and too residually stoned, and just plain
too dumb.
“Today, I declare war on violence.” He smacked his
lips as he talked because he thought it made him sound
more like a cowboy.
“I will hunt down violence without rest and I will
beat it without mercy. My hand will be as the hand of
God wielding an iron pipe, beating the head of
violence until the skull breaks, spilling the head of
violence onto the concrete. I will rape violence and
plunder its wealth.”
Two or three people exchanged confused looks at
President Vegetation’s words, but before they could
offer any questions, the vast majority let loose a
cheer of approval.
“Then I will hunt down hatred.” W. continued. “I will
grab hatred by the neck and choke the life out of it.
I will throttle hatred with all the power of my
scrawny little pathetic body. I will lift hatred into
the air and fling it a thousand miles from this land
of the free and the home of the brave.”
“Wait a minute.” Somebody finally said. “That doesn’t
make any sense...”
“Watch out!” President Vegetation interrupted, “the
terrorist alert level just jumped to orange.”
“What?” Said the lonely voice, but it was soon drowned
out by the gasps of the vast majority who started
waving to their president with supplicant arms.
“Save us, save us from this phantom terror!” They
screamed, and the objection of the one voice of reason
was lost in the rush.
“Let me tell you how I will save you,” the president
continued. “You see these, your civil rights,” he made
a motion as if he was holding something in his hand,
then he tossed the imaginary object over his shoulder,
“gone!”
The crowd cheered.
“I think in this moment of crisis, it would be better
if I just held on to your freedoms for a while. We’ll
store them some safe place, under lock and key where
no terrorists can take them. That place will forever
be the bastion of what America truly stands for. Our
liberty is too sacred for people to risk by actually
using it on a daily basis!”
The people cheered.
“Wait a minute!” Somebody said.
“Shut up you traitor!” The crowd screamed in
indignation, “how can you sow the seeds of disharmony
in this our moment of greatest need?”
But the voice was undeterred, “Maybe our moment of
greatest need is exactly the moment when we should be
looking to the values that made our nation strong
rather than systematically destroying them.”
“The terror threat just went to sea-foam green!” The
president interrupted. The people started running
around in circles screaming fearfully.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” The voice of
reason cried, “why is everybody freaking out?” But
again they didn’t listen.
“Come to me my children.” President Leafy W.
Vegetation said again, “come to me and listen to my
tales about my war on uncontrolled anger.”
The people sat before him and listened eagerly.
“I will scream in the face of uncontrolled anger. I
will attack it with the sharpened nails of my hands. I
will let the veins bulge in my face and neck. I will
run uncontrolled anger from the boarders of the
world!”
The people cheered.
“I will declare a war on evil. I will declare a war on
all things non-American which is how I define evil.
You will turn all your freedoms and liberties over to
me in this moment of crisis and you will look to me as
you look to your God. You will trust to me as you
trust to your all-father. I will be all powerful. I
will eradicate all evil from this world using the
force of arms. Any person who hurts an American or
conspires to hurt an American will be killed and their
family burned. I will not rest until all the evil has
been driven from this Earth by the guns and superior
weaponry of our great nation.”
The cheer was deafening, but when it died down there
was one meek voice speaking out in response.
“The only way to fight evil is with forgiveness.”
President Leafy W. Vegetation turned his spindly
little eye on the lone dissenter. He was a good
Christian and he knew how to handle such sacrilegious
nay-sayers.
“Have that traitor crucified!”
And the funny part is, that even as he stabbed the
heckler in the chest with a spear and personally
nailed his wrists into the wooden plank, President
Leafy W. Vegetation thought he was doing good.
And the people kept cheering.
Never realizing that their jubilation verified that
they weren’t worthy of the brave young men who
sacrificed their lives to buy freedom for them.
After that great cost.
Handed over to a vegetable.
Without a struggle.
Because it’s the easiest thing to do.
And they’re cowards.
The End
--copyright © B.J., aka, Death Pestilence
all rights reserved
unauthorized duplication prohibited by all applicable laws
(You can visit Death's own web site here)
WAR WATCHING
by Venie Holmgrem
MORNING THE THIRD
march 22
She wakes trembling reaches in the half light
for the bedside water jug decants drinks greedily
the hours long vigil has taken its toll.
she draws back curtains opens blinds doors windows
to the morning cool. Outside a single star a fading moon
the quiet quiet air a street lamp as brilliant
as on any ordinary dawning
on the river flat a sea of mist
in the vacant block the tall trees
Later there’ll be bird song later still
another evening of watching listening analyzing
the evidence laid out
about a war in a far away country
no blood no corpses no pieces of corpses
scanty news of death count
colourful fireworks and sound affects aplenty
and everything topped with the soothing syrup
of carefully self censored words
packaged and sanitized
home delivery
for instant consumption.
MORNING THE FIFTH
march 24.
It’s a real war now
corpses aplenty on both sides
the growing tally of deaths from ‘friendly fire’
America Uber Alles sounding ever so slightly off key
the sanitized packaging rapidly coming unstuck.
She breakfasts on a lightly boiled egg with organic rye toast
thinks of the dead and dying babies and children.
Do Iraqi mothers love their children as much as we love ours?
What do they think as they suckle their babies from desiccating breasts
measure out spoonful by spoonful into thirsty little throats
the precious water?
Questions hang in the morning air.
Meanwhile Australian war heroes hand back their medals
burn their uniforms remind a stone deaf leadership
that the monstrous dictator in Baghdad
is a monster that they have created.
She wonders what tomorrow morning will bring.
MORNING THE FIFTEENTH
april 3.
She stopped watching a few days ago
the exhaustion was terrible
listens briefly each day at early morning.
Today, as daylight spreads across her world
news of the cluster bombing
of a maternity hospital somewhere in Iraq
cluster bombs being the most recent gift to civilization
of the progenitors of the New World Order
They are not of course, weapons of mass destruction
but Iraqi hearts and minds
are inexplicably slipping out of grasp.
She opens the back door
stands looking out
imagination running wild
sees the clean cut lines of timber trusses
that support the patio roof
the carefully placed and tended hanging baskets of ribbon grass
the hoya cascading in translucent green down from the water tank
the cleanly swept red brick paving
the memories of festive occasions
a birthday anniversary a homecoming
all now a mass of tangled wreckage.
She remembers having once counted all the gang nails
in the patio construction
admired their simple efficient ingenuity
thought about the long hours of patient hard work
built into the creation of this modest edifice.
She sees the roof of her home peeled back
and lying crazily across the verandah
walls crumpled books, paintings, sculptures,
the neatly folded bed linen
years of photographic records of her family life
reduced to rubble.
She thinks bitterly of the passionate words she had spoken
from a peace platform on a day that seems a lifetime ago
knowing as she did so that it was all in vain
She thinks that perhaps from tomorrow
she won’t even listen any more.
MORNING THE SIXTEENTH
April 4.
It’s compulsive. She must continue to listen
and knows that she’ll soon start watching again.
Today she reminds herself as she had reminded her listeners
that the invader has never experienced an invading army on its own soil.
She has heard an Australian Brigadier assure his listeners that
no, we will not use cluster bombs and no, we will not
escort any planes that do.
The Brigadier squirms under probing questions.
A deeply religious friend has seen the Devil
sitting on Donald Rumsfeld’s shoulder
reports that he seems rather comfortable there.
Embedded journalists continue to do and to say
just what they are told to do and to say
although one has just dropped his guard
and talked about the invaders
but with a photo of a British journo,
the commentator conveniently forgets to remember
that he was murdered by American ‘friendly fire’
Respected neutral groups like Amnesty International
beg the invaders to stop using cluster bombs.
The cluster bombs continue drifting prettily down
colour still yellow as it was in Afghanistan.
Archeologists are frantic – destruction of the history
of this Cradle of Civilization, this ancient land of Mesopotamia.
A bomb crater large enough to house a two storey building
leaves little hope for precious artifacts that may have been uncovered.
She walks out into the morning
inspects her garden
larkspurs and snapdragons doing fine
late roses in bloom.
There are beans to harvest
lettuce hearts are swelling
turnips, radishes, beetroot and broccoli
thrusting through to the light
the flat green seed leaves of self sown silver beet
all this peace and plenitude
Is it really happening as we see it over there?
MORNING THE NINETEENTH
april 7.
Last night she had watched the Storm Troopers
battering down doors to burst in on unarmed families
had seen Iraqi prisoners of war with bags tied over their heads
had felt an urgent need to debrief
a hot shower? a cold shower? pop a few valium?
drink a soothing herbal tea?
It was too dark to work in the garden
She had snapped on the porch light
taken scissors and basket
and gone out looking for flowers
white snapdragons – white for purity
white for mourning their dead
as they use it in Vietnam,
white for the bandages
swathing mutilated little bodies in Iraqi hospital beds
and red salvia for the blood seeping through.
How many others are reacting as she is?
She feels a desperate need to know.
She understands now that after Iraq it will be Syria? Saudi Arabia?
a revisiting of Afghanistan? The name doesn’t matter
the slaughter will continue
the new Rome- raining death from the skies
and horseless chariots of steel spewing destructive fire
on all who impede the path.
And still no weapons of mass destruction have been found.
There are Australian shoulders in plenty
for the Devil to perch on including her own
for she is horrified at her reaction to news of deaths
among the American invaders
She has good friends over there. Are they feeling as she is?
This morning she walks to the Post Office
mails packets of her peace poems to Australian family,
to American friends,
feeling a powerful need to link hands with them across the oceans
mingling her grief and her shame with theirs.
POSTSCRIPT TO A NIGHTMARE
…only
the monstrous anger of the guns Wilfred Owen
It seems that it’s all over now – victory to be officially declared
a brief glimpse of independent journalists in their Baghdad hotel
kneeling before armed American soldiers
loaded guns pointed at their heads.
An Iraqi boy without arms and without legs
lies on a bed
in a hospital without power and without water
Children beg for water in the streets of Baghdad.
A terrible suspicion slowly evolves – behind the scenes
a systematic slaughter of Iraqi civilians –
bullets? thirst? starvation? disease?
Does it matter how?
Can this really be happening?
She turns to History for an answer
and History quietly answers Yes.
In Vietnam, says History
American soldiers took prisoners up in helicopters
and threw them overboard.
In Vietnam, says History, even more quietly,
they had themselves photographed
holding up by the hair
the severed heads of their enemy dead
sent the photos home for publication.
Predictable behaviour, says History,
a sharp edge to her voice,
from troops whose President had urged them to
‘nail that coon skin against the wall.’
Religious hostilities, repressed in Saddam Hussein’s secular state
now break loose. An Iraqi cleric, flying in from London
to mediate the warring factions, is promptly murdered.
It is now obvious that the invaders are here to stay.
General Jay Garner, overseeing developments in post war Iraq
willno doubt be ably assisted by General Motors, General Electric
and a certain Colonel Sanders of Kentucky.
Saddam Hussein’s last desperate bid
to rid his nation of the American incubus
has failed.
Iraq will return to the United States dollar
deserting the Euro currency
onto which it went late in the year 2000
The message to other oil producing nations rings crystal clear
A despairing friend has taken to walking
the night streets
painting the single word PEACE on power poles
of the small bones to be thrown them from the spoils of victory
American actors
no longer needed to play out in Eastern costumes,
and under make-up
the ‘news items’ foisted on unsuspecting viewers
will have to find other gainful employment to pay the rent.
All seems in darkness.
However, her sense of history reminds her
of a simple slogan applicable to the new Behemoth
‘The higher they rise the harder they fall’
and she knows that with the swing of the pendulum
something cleaner and saner
will ultimately rise from the ruins.
--copyright © Venie
Holmgren
Pambula, NSW 2549 Australia
april 2003
Read more about Venie HERE!
and HERE: http://www.spacountry.net.au/holmgren/People.html
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Freedom
I
by Marceline Lasater
This
morning the sky is trying to cry
Eyeing
and then feasting
On
the menagerie of gluttonous crawling
creatures devouring all the new tender leaves
The
colors
The
blossoms
The
moist rich eart
With
fresh fat tunnels
In
my yard
To
know that this is not so
Before,
I
never considered
How
free I am
Freedom
II
last
night as I drove out to pick up my son
after
his dad made him go to scouts
hovering
over the motorcycle trail/endangered
species habitat
I
cursed national security
but
reserved judgment for the possibility
that
it was a 911 saviour
and
thought nothing more about it
until
I came back that way an hour later
and
saw five bright lights clustered
suspended
in the sky
with
one streaming down into the park
my
son said it was a UFO
because
it was standing shock still and making no noise
at
least none that could be heard over the roar of
one engine
on
a desolate wooded road
but
it was a helicopter
and
we just don't know
why
it was there
who
was hurt
if
anyone
and
there was no mention in the paper
Freedom
III
later
checking the mail
a
moment for myself
in
a harem-scarem day
and
a neighbor walked by
and
showed me his incision
where
he had his ulnar nerve
moved
into his forearm
because
his fingers had gone numb
from
resting his elbows at the computer all day
and
told me how he drove off an eighty foot cliff
coming
home in December
how
the truck burned to a crisp
and
his seat belt wouldn't undo
and
the automated windows wouldn’t roll down
but
he got out
with
his cell phone
and
called 911
and
his wife drove off another one
on
the same road
coming
home
they
are divorced now
against
the arab who laid a driveway through his front yard
Freedom
IV
and
my son told me about an interesting conversation he had with his dad
about
how scouts would make him more mature
they
had company the other day
and
said 'no one will be going in there anyway'
he's
gathering his courage
to
tell his dad
that
truth is sometimes punished
like
a caterpillar
who
might emit poison
while
being devoured
--copyright
©
ML
unauthorized
duplication
prohibited by all applicable laws.
You can
read more of Marceline's poems
HERE
in
this website, too!
And
from Thom
the World Poet:
from America!
from other countries, they shuffle
here
to unload their genes into a pool of time.
stir it well and deep/mix with metaphors/
create a new mutant who walks backwards/
knows nothing of its history/and less of its creation
yet who stumbles blindly towards all strangers
as if they were competitors.
"MINE!"--it will repeat endlessly, robotically, as it is all taken
away--home, health, history--even the very tongue they imported.
it was not the right one.
now they will have to relearn everything.
--copyright©2003
thom woodruff
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rights reserved
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duplication
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You can also visit Thom at his own web pages HERE!
And from Drippin's own
Poetessa, Nancy
Fierstien:
Independence
This land is mine,
this land mine's mine --
I found it in the street.
How lucky for me.
I continue to be.
I hobble, wobble,
stand
on my own new feet.
--copyright ©
2003 Nancy Fierstien
all
rights reserved.
unauthorized
duplication
prohibited by all applicable laws.
You
can go read more of Nancy's poetry HERE
in
this website , and go to her own website HERE!