'God Bless All Y'All'

adapted from Memories Lost to a Whirlwind Alight on Facebook to Be Claimed

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/30/us/30reunite.html?_r=1&hp#

Grand daddy holds his favorite hunting dog

In a water stained photograph

Falling from the sky

200 miles from our stormy home

A high school diploma

Yellowed and curled

Marooned in faraway backyard

Homemade wedding ring quilt

Heavy with rainwater

Plucked from a ditch

Spent checks, bank statements

Financial lives floating through strange fingers

Scores of mildewing pictures,

Grinning family Polaroids,

Somber faces in black and white

daguerreotypes

Dirtied newspaper clippings

Unopened letters bearing outdated stamps

Sodden stuffed animals with ironic smiles

Sonogram warped at the edges

Cracking through the center

First image of a beating heart

Cradled by unknown hands

Weight of a Crown

adapted from To Fanfare, Prince William and Kate Middleton Marry

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/30/world/europe/30britain.html?_r=1&hp

The weight of this crown

Lowered greater heads than mine

Yet countless pounds of jewels

Will not bow me today

The length of this train

Hand wrought of ivory

Intricate as spider’s lace

Will not make me stumble

The dictators in the front pews

Their hands bathed in blood

Will not draw a protest from my lips

For you, this may seem a

Storybook day of horse drawn carriages,

Footmen in tunics wrought of gold,

Women wearing hats festooned with ribbons,

Endless tinkling of crystal goblets filled with Champagne

I remain clear eyed despite

The veil’s delicate gauze

Drowned in a Foreign Sea

inspired by 300 migrants feared dead after boat capsizes off Sicily http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/06/300-migrants-feared-dead-sicily 

Born in Bangladesh

Childhood in Chad

Escaped from Eritrea

Ivory Coast or Nigeria

Somalia or Sudan

All migrated to Libya

Their money stolen

Guns forced into unwilling hands

Hope,

A creaky wooden ship,

A child’s toy,

Filled with sea water and sank

Eons from home
The lost float face down
in a foreign sea

Carnival Barkers and Sideshows

inspired by Obama Releases ‘Long-Form’ Birth Certificate http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/27/obamas-long-form-birth-certificate-released/?hp

Plumes of doubt,

Noxious as hot tar,

Billow above heads, empty as cartoon thought bubbles

They hold parchment up to light

Scrutinize its seal

Inspect fonts

Nurse their disquiet

Acceptance is defeat

Facts negotiable

Ignorance is strength

Destabalize

adapted from The tunnel that allowed 488 Taliban prisoners to crawl 1,000ft to freedom http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/the-tunnel-that-allowed-488-taliban-prisoners-to-crawl-1000ft-to-freedom-2274711.html

Jagged hole

Through solid cement

Winds underground

Tunneling past razor wire, security cameras

Armed guards and check- points

Muscle, grit, faith

Defeat  machine guns and metal cages

Subterranean digging

In the soil beneath your feet

Can you feel it quaking?

Dear Reader

Dear Reader,

Are you taking tea in the UK?

Swimming in the Black Sea?

Running in heels to catch a cab in Singapore?

I picture you

Driving a Volkswagen on the Autobahn

Praying in a mosque in Indonesia

Walking through fields of tulips in the Netherlands

Exploring green hills of Cork

Nursing your son in Kenya

Shopping at the Mercado in Mexico

For a few quiet moments

Distance collapses

Minds meet

Your presence, a benediction

Poetry, prayer shared

Coffin Nail

Inspired by   Tobacco firms used diet-aid chemicals

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/tobacco-firms-used-dietaid-chemicals-2274072.html

Lung dart

Cancer stick

Kill throat

Coffin nail

Aching  to quit

My weight would climb

Until numbers on the scale

Left me trembling,

Reaching for a smoke

Soon I’ll be slim as a cigarette

Light as vapor

Blowing from tainted lips

Graffiti

inspired by Admirers Call It Art, but the Police Call It a Problem

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/23/us/23graffiti.html?_r=1&hpw

Four seniors in high school

Sheltered as suburbia

Sweet as summertime

We were AP, Honor Roll, Peer Group Leaders

Good girls

Sharing a can of green spray paint

Under the new concrete underpass at 3:30 am

Plumes of evergreen burst into being

Declaring our names

Sanctimonious college graduate in a Toyota

Pulled her car over

Screamed at us

“Why don’t you plant a tree?”

We laughed until dawn

As each drippy letter dried

Striving for permanence

Only graffiti can promise

Menu Selections

Oyster and ocean in Denmark;

Jelly of quail meets crayfish cream in England;

Lemongrass, dragon fruit, finger lime, and cucumber in Chicago;

Oysters and Pearls in Manhattan

Gifts from the sea and sun 

http://www.theworlds50best.com/awards/1-50-winners 

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Three Cups of Tea

adapted from Three Cups of Deceit by Jonathan Krakauer

Ghost schools

Empty shells , broken promises,

In Afghanistan

Perch at the end of long, dusty roads

In punishing mountains,

In the rolling foothills, in wind-swept towns,

In bustling cities

Schools are silent

Millions wasted

On chartered jets, book promotions,

Ego and lies

Uplifting tale of Afghanistan

A fiction we longed to believe

Murder of the Messenger

The inhumane conditions of Bradley Manning's detention

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/14/manning

“Manning: Well, it was forwarded to [WikiLeaks] - and god knows what happens now - hopefully worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms - if not, than [sic] we're doomed - as a species - I will officially give up on the society we have if nothing happens - people who saw, knew there was something wrong . . . I want people to see the truth… regardless of who they are… because without information, you cannot make informed decisions as a public.”

Unconvicted

On a Military brig

In Quantico,Virginia

Caged

In a 6 by 12 foot cell

23 hours each day

Checked by faceless guards every five minutes

Solitary confinement

Barred from exercising muscles

Denied pillow, sheets, pajamas

Forced to report naked each morning to guards

Glasses confiscated

Left in blindness

Seeing visions

Hearing voices

Words disappearing

Misrata

Gaddafi will retake Misrata in days without Nato help, say rebels 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/18/gaddafi-misrata-nato-rebels

Twelve families

Live, breathe, pray, wait

In a tumbledown house near the sea

Others live in open air

In shipping containers

In filth and hope

Misrata,

Bombs rain on you,

Unceasing days, nights without rest

The sea taunts, the only hope of escape

Water surrounds, but may not save you

Your children have haunted eyes and empty bellies

Your mothers are killed waiting in line  

For bread

You have no baby formula

No diapers

No anesthesia

Your hospitals, reduced to Medieval scenes

Of carnage and need

Gaddafi

The Brother Leader, The Guide

sends only

mortar bombs & tank shells

Everywhere his soldiers menace 

With machine guns

With cluster bombs

With hunger and fatigue

With despair

http://www.npr.org/2011/04/18/135524577/libya-agrees-to-give-u-n-aid-access-to-misrata

Outliving Their Lives

adapted from Language at risk of dying out – the last two speakers aren't talking

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/13/mexico-language-ayapaneco-dying-out

Nuumte Oote

The True Voice

Remains unspoken

Only two wizened men in Mexico

Still dream in Ayapaneco

Words, which once sang from a village of tongues,

Planted and harvested,

Now lie fallow.

Scholars, let them be.

Your dictionary and institutes

Will not bring back 

A chorus of voices

Haggling at the market, sharing the news,

Hushed whispers of lovers.

A culture, a universe,

Dies inside these men.

Forgetting Her Name

adapted from Every Parent's Worst Nightmare: How Ketamine Killed our Daughter

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/apr/17/louise-cattell-parents-ketamine-campaign

Her hair the color of tangerines,

Wearing black glasses, and a daisy covered smock

Smiling in sunlight

Her hair, lemon yellow,

Robed in rainbow, clad in combat boots

Faux pout with laughing eyes

Her hair the bright green of leprechauns

Mouth smirking, winking at the camera

Day-glo life,

Painting in the afternoons

Dancing euphoric trance in darkness  

Kandi Kid

Ketamine* hallucinations

Falling, flying,

Seeing the thread that binds all living things,

Talking to God,

Forgetting her own name,

Drifting off to sleep

In a deep K tunnel

Turning her back to the party

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketamine#Recreational_use

*Ketamine is used a horse tranquilizer, and as an anesthetic for humans

Snogless

 adapted from Hundreds attend kiss-in outside John Snow pub after venue closes its doors 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/apr/15/john-snow-kiss-in-london

Surrounded by 1,000 embraces

Only I remain solitary

Men kiss and touch

Whiskered cheeks brush

Smiles seduce

Eyes alight

Lips linger

In a crowd of 1,000 kisses

I purse my lips, and pray

Rite of Passage

adapted from The midwife on a mission to stop female genital mutilation

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/apr/15/female-genital-mutilation-midwife-kenya

In the Cherangani Hills of Kenya

Surrounded by trees

Men turn their backs,

Women hold hands, grit strong white teeth.

Removing pleasure

Cuts away childhood

Slitting clitoris

Insures virginity

With slash of dull blade

Girl becomes woman

Who must scream in silence

Sewed tightly shut

They are gifts to be opened by husbands,

Or by the curved horn of an animal,

Or by a bloody infant,

Ripping its path into the world

Goodwill

Inspired by 'O, Miami' Celebrates Verse With A Poem Per Person

http://m.npr.org/news/Arts+%26+Life/135221964

Frost hides in the pocket of a soft red flannel

Blake's tucked in the seam of faded Levis

Whitman's secretly sewn into a thick camel hair coat

Dickinson in the lining of a battered suitcase
Words to warm even the loneliest traveler

Streak of white pinpricks

On black ultrasound

Fade to darkness

Unknowable cosmos within

Starry white overtaken by inky black

Statistics

One hundred women

Playing musical chairs

Dancing nervously

Giddy with tension

Eyes darting

Waiting for band to stop

Who will scramble to happiness?

Who will be left 

Standing in silence?