We Do the Best We Can

In this world that rewards

The cruel the ruthless and the mad

We grow sick fall into chronic pain

Or go mad ourselves

When we get hurt

There is no way to stop working

And the hospitals ask for our papers

We take drugs drink alcohol

Fall asleep in the sun in blurry

Booziness or stay high all day

Trying to remain apart from it

But we are in it and we see

Them pilot private jets

Into the burning horizon

Build tract homes

On the wildflower prairies

To get by you must live

Without consequences

And this we must teach to those

Who do not understand this

Living in their villages

Weaving textiles feeding their animals

Greeting the sun the earth the rain

Please listen that is the dance of fools

We must tell them

Don't you understand this

Charge money for water

And sell guns to enforce this

Let each other die

And be indifferent to this

This is very important

Chop dig demolish burn

And some of you will ascend

A golden ladder

Because you have earned it

(Photo by Victoria Vera)

Two Pasts

Meaning of Irish Portuguese

Both are on the Atlantic

With the cold sea winds blowing

The lands taken

Famine snatching lives

Grimly from the fields

I understand why the Irish left

Though I do not know

What they left behind

Moving south over

The tumbling blue-gray ocean

Madeira's another island

Limned by cliffs though

Black volcanic stone

Covered in flowers

The same small chapels

Now ringed by weeds

Why they left

I can't be sure

But I think I know

What they left behind

The two peoples' songs

Are not so different

Souls venturing out

Into the waves

To return or not

Or disappearing into

The green hills and valleys

And leaving behind

The memory of a song

Sung one midnight

The same white moon

Looking down

On the north Atlantic

The North African Atlantic

Through the clear air

You could see

Contours of gray mountains

On the distant lunar landscape

All that remained now

Were the melody

And the words

Some forgotten

JB Plays God

You will be penned into

A 142 mi.² space

Your food and water

Will be cut

And as you expire

And begin to buckle

Like stalks of plants

Unwatered

Food will fall

From the sky

You won't know where

You won't know when

Suddenly

JB! JB! his power over

Life & death

Is magical

Such mercy to have

His bombs kill us

While boxes of cans

And dry packaged

Calories shower us

From above

Little parachutes

And drones

Floating and humming

Snatched by hungry hands

Now we may decide

Who will live

Who will die

Our son or our daughter

The "Border Crisis"

Into your lands

We will send bullets

Forest-eating machines

Drill platforms

Poised in the waters

Like thirsty metallic birds

We will send food items

Glazed with polymers

Infused with sweetness

And oceans of films

Devoid of meaning

You will dig

Mine and harvest

And we will consume

And what we emit

Will trouble the rains

Ravage the coastlines

Increase the sun's heat

Parch the meadows

Spoil your crops

Soldiers we train and pay

Will ransack your towns

And kill your animals

Each effort at movement

We will thwart with plots

Impenetrable and wicked

Our sailors will crowd your ports

Overthrow your states

Many times

You will be shot

By guns we sell

To people harvesting

Distilling cooking substances

That we consume

As we languish and shatter

Their bullets will break you

You will live in fear

You will flee

Cross deserts

Scale fences

Crouch leap

Stand still

Drink warm water

From dusty milk jugs

In slivers of shadow

And when you arrive

We will turn you away

Curse and blaspheme you

Say you are the reason

For everything bad

We will say

We were really something

Before you got here

It was lemonade and Cadillacs

How dare you come

To feed off of our largesse

Our good heartedness

Our hard work

Why must you

Make us act so cruel

What must we do now

To keep you away

Shoot

 

Shoot the starving as they run for flour

Shoot the doctors as they treat the patients

Shoot the teacher sleeping in the school

Shoot the mother saying evening prayers

Shoot the child hiding in the tree

Shoot the driver picking up the wounded

Shoot the wounded waiting in the car

Shoot the poet writing one more line

Shoot the singer singing one more verse

Shoot the dancer doing one more step

Shoot the dog looking around the yard

Shoot the cat shoot the sheep

Shoot the donkey pulling the death cart

Should the reporter taking one more note

Shoot the undertaker writing one more writ

Shoot the caretaker digging one more grave

Poem of Despair & Longing

 

All will be sacrificed

22 veterans a day

Will kill themselves

Winter will vanish

Whole peoples are disappeared

Their languages dance song

Remembered only by the trees

The trees are cut down

And will be remembered

By stones

Silent

In the great absence

All is reduced

Men douse themselves

In gasoline

And erupt into flames

Forests reduce to tinder

And blaze on the far horizon

Ocean currents stall or reverse

Golden algae blossoms

And chokes the warming waters

Animals in laboratories

Die of boredom

Or loneliness

Sacrificed

Wealth is accumulated

Celebrities dwell

In parallel dimensions

And shimmer in the distance

Like fata morgana

It is not for gods

Or goddesses

Or spirits found

In landscapes

In waters

That the sacrifice occurs

But for urges

That renew eternally

As each destruction finishes

Or maybe it's all just

Due to bad ideas

But that's kind of

Anti-climactic

Narratively disappointing

Probably it's for both

And battles that are lost

Are as important

As those that are won

Permitting survival

Within chaos & great stupidity

Permitting memory

To persist

And meaning

note: I think the poem below is written in a similar spirit to which WB Yeats wrote "The Second Coming." He sensed something malevolent descending upon Europe between the wars and sought words to express this. By writing this, I too am trying to articulate the dark, destructive thing quite active in the world today. I am for realism, creativity, imagination, community, emotional resilience and vulnerability, but against despair. Despair is too painful and should be avoided. But witness and resistance in any and all of its forms is to be pursued and despair may be encountered in this process. Nonetheless, I believe and my experience shows me goodness, even happiness is still possible even under these conditions.

A Child In Gaza Speaks of His Friends

 

there's one I can't find

one with one leg

one with no mother

one underground

one under rubble

one with one eye

one with no hands

there's one I can't find

one who can't hear

one who can't laugh

one in the north

without any food

one in the south

without any roof

there's one I can't find

one who played soccer

one who played chess

one who liked cats

one who liked birds

one who liked math

one who liked verses

there's one I can't find

one in my dreams

when I have dreams

when I can sleep

which is not very often

she tells me something

that I cannot hear

there's one I can't find

one by a wall

one by the roadside

one by the shore

searching the tide

one in the moonlight

one in the sun

there's one I can't find

one I remember

one that I can't

one day we sang songs

in the bright afternoon

there was the scent of fresh bread

that's what I recall

there's one I can't find