Lucky White Girl

September 11th, October 7th

On the 6th Anniversary, a poem I wrote that recalls the feelings of those days called September 11th/October 7th.

We want revenge
Because the sky has fallen into the earth
And it’s hard to breathe dirt
And our mouths are filled with ashes
And we don’t know what else to do

I cannot tell where the line of people ends
They circle back and start over again

Faces of terror and retribution
Staring dryly in the early morning haze
Stunned
In the fog and smoke of bombed buildings
In New York
In Afghanistan
They pick up the pieces
And start again

And the suited men in capitals
Seated around tables in safe cities
Start over again
While the shells of children cry out
Their bodies litter the streets

There is war here
And the peacemakers
And the soldiers
Walk the same torn and bleeding earth
They pick through the pieces
And start again

"Sadiq" by Brian Turner

This is a poem I have copied onto an index card and stuck to the wall in my bedroom.  I remember not too long ago I must've read it again before going to sleep and the first and last lines echoed in my head all night long, coloring my dreams.  It's by an amazing young poet who served seven years in the US Army.  Only some lines by Yeats have affected me in a similar manner.

Sadiq
by Brian Turner

It is a condition of wisdom in the archer to be patient because when the arrow leaves the bow, it returns no more.

It should make you shake and sweat
nightmare you, strand you in a desert
of irrevocable desolation, the
consequences
seared into the vein, no matter
what adrenaline
feeds the muscle its courage
no matter
what god shines down on you
no matter
what crackling pain and anger
you carry in your fists, my friend
it should break your heart to kill.

How to Remember (poem)

Look into the sun.
Dive into the water.
Lie in your bed and throw the sheet up
Slowly.  So slowly.
Now you know what heaven is.
Now you know
how to remember.

You have to practice. 
you know it, like the feel
Of your head on your mother’s lap,
Like her fingers tracing
The contours of your ear.
Instinctively you remember: you, suspended,
light air water.  It envelopes you.
There are no boundaries.
You are everywhere.

You remember, else how did you know what perfect was
When you were so young?
You imaged it in your dreams,
birthday parties and Christmases
A million colors, a million faces, just light and air
You will be light as air
With no name.
And this freedom will make you giddy
You just know.

All along you have not forgotten.
It happened on your
happy birth day.
Once.
And it will happen again,
If you just wait.

And meanwhile, look at the sky
See the sun kissing your eyelashes.
Don’t turn away.  Just wait.
There is so much you don't remember.

Rumination on possible deaths resulting from two hunting rifle cartridges found in two different countries

It fell here at some point
on the corner of 4th Avenue and 6th Street
and I came along and found it.

A rifle cartridge.
Bright, golden, it easily caught my eye.
Look, it said, glittering in the street
My smooth shiny skin still reflects the light
of a thousand Florida suns.

I don’t know much about rifle cartridges.
All I knew is that it had come from a gun.

Maybe a cop had fired it last night
crouched behind the door of her cruiser,
shooting at the suspect.

The thought of this drama
occurring on the corner I pass
every day on my bike
was disconcerting at least.

Maybe it had fallen out of the back of
some hunter’s pickup
as they drove with the carcass
hardening in the bed,
thick with sweat from its mad dash
through the National Forest.

The light turned green.
I remembered
another time something
like this
caught my eye.

They were green and plastic
not gold and shiny.
Shotgun shells
from rubber boot clad campesino armies
half-heartedly
fighting a 40 year war.

I picked them up out of the foliage along the path near the river
and took them home.
Maybe they were shooting at a capybara.
Maybe at a tree.
Maybe they just wanted to make some noise
to sow fear into sleeping families
in case they were thinking of collaborating with the other side
I still have them in my desk drawer, years later.

Guns fire
and for all the long, complicated, painful histories of violence, oppression and death
that they leave in their wake,
these shells are the only tangible things
left for us to pick up.

I picked it up
and rode home thinking about guns and violence and death
souvenirs in my pocket.

"Living close to the ground": on embracing -and balancing- anger

Those back and forth posts about politics, religion and spirituality (see post and comments below) have me thinking about my own spirituality lately, so this is going to be one of those confessional posts.

I have been developing a very bad temper over the past 2-3 years.  It came out again this morning as I was biking to class --I didn't want to go.  There's a beautiful thunderstorm coming and I wanted to stay home and drink a nice cup of coffee and watch the rain.  GIL's gone off on an errand and so I have some alone time.  I like to do these deep check-ins with myself every now and then.  But I couldn't this morning.  I had to go to my stupid class (I took a mental health day two weeks ago so I couldn't take one again today). 

So I get on my bike and go and I'm sorta running late but I make good time on the 3 mile trip and I get to campus and I come to an intersection where there are no cars in sight (this is on campus, okay?  The roads are blocked off during the day to private vehicles) and I see the motorcycle cop on the corner but I do a little rolling stop anyway (as opposed to a complete stop where the wheels stop turning) and of course he gives me a ticket.  Shame on me for not thinking of course he's going to be a jerk; he's a cop ferchrissakes!

And I get really, really angry. 

The ultimate solidarity: living between the lines

Anyone who is having a bad day or is too stressed out already, should not read this post.  You have to measure your grief, portion it out or it will immobilize you.  On the other hand, this is the world we live in.  As Auden said "look if you like, but you will have to leap" "our dream of safety has to disappear"

Someone who used to work for the same organization I used to work for is dead in Iraq.  They found his body in West Baghdad two days ago.  It is RUMORED that his body showed signs of torture*.

There is a man on the front page of the New York Times today who was also tortured but he survived.  He is the man in one of the infamous pictures that came out of Abu Ghraib.  And is now campaigning against it.

Once, when I was in Colombia, while on a routine outing, another girl and I found a man who had been tortured and dumped in the river.  He floated gracefully past children lined up along the banks to watch in front of thatch roofed houses. 

All over the world people live under and speak out against thugs who do this kind of thing.

And when the thugs are "our own"?... well, that's sometimes a tough spot to be in.  Like this lady is probably finding out.  That's her battle.  Fighting Bush Co. is ours.

And so here in the United States too are some of those people.  Tom Fox was one.

They live between the lines.

Break out

For Tom Fox who broke out and lived between the lines.

    I.

We get tired, sometimes, of our leaders,
all the time replacing each other
all the time repeating each other
We are outraged, embarrassed and hurt
But we have to admit that
we do not know.

And we get tired, sometimes, of the lies.
And get tired of the fear and the rage
Of the constant crisis--constantly a crisis--
And the coiled cobras in our bellies
click their tails in anger
but do not strike.

We live in a nowhere land
between those we fight
and those who fight against those we fight.
Like the Germans who fought the Nazis
and were afraid of the Allies.
To resist Empire is lonely work.

We live within the lines, constantly in the lines,
until one day it happens

We break out.

    II.
A nation-state is a fiction.
We break out.
Race and gender is a fiction
We break out.
You or me is a fiction
We break out.

We live between the lines.

This is the ultimate solidarity.

My life, like yours.
My life, just
        like yours.

    III.
How do you unmake war?

Tom in Chicago holding photos of Iraqi kids.
Kids in Iraq holding photos of Tom
and the other three:

you hold my photo and I'll hold yours
and together we will resist
these thugs.

And break out.   

[crossposted at Bring it On!]

* UPDATE: CPT has since posted a release dispelling these rumors.  It appears that their captors were more humane to our people in this case than we have been to theirs.

The time for writing

The time for writing lies
in the space the water leaves
before it closes over the hole
left by a body diving headfirst into it.