CONFESSION ZERO

What if war were just a chaotic dress rehearsal in a school play and torture were long philosophical conversations with idiots, bullets, tiny bits of lint culled from laughing soldier's uniforms, fighter jets, kites dropping from the shoulders of the sun, warships, marshmallows floating in a sea of hot chocolate, and tanks, funny little cars full of tumbling clowns? O! If only it were so then all of the world's hideous warmongers might be paper dolls in rooms full of beautiful children, each with a pair of scissors... © 2008 mrp/thepoetryman Demand a Ceasefire in Gaza Now!

...when I think of the soldiers packing gear, their guns silent, tanks still, standing at the ready, eyes moist with liberation and grief, hands wrung their last, I think of them gleaming, striding away from the savagery, the dying, the defeated, the triumphant... colorless stench. When I see them marching out, freed of the difficult sand, I imagine that black soldiers are most anxious for home, valling for the stretch of time to witness their history, onlooker to human hope instead of war’s gangling limbs stacked like firewood on streets smothered in suffering. When I think of all of the soldiers coming home shipped in those god-awful frowning boxes, I try to imagine their loved and beautiful faces, but their smiles float away from who they were. What a sad and ghastly testament of their use. Dear Poet, May your use, your words paint upon this, grant us reprieve from an unfavorable history. Free our hearts and our minds of horrid combat, for war is the chain that has enslaved ...

Arabs hail shoe-hurling journalist As time bends the body down, war, torture, agony and lies do erect the mind in rage. O! Had he the strength to hurl the millions of bones. Supreme Court orders review of Guantanamo torture case What of this dismal occasion is left to unearth, what of it do we not already know? Their echoes of anguish grown of our stillness like flag draped caskets floating home. The misery chambers long quiet, save for the lasting pleas of vengeance. Israel frees hundreds of Palestinian prisoners A bird of prey was meant to fly. Move about like dreams. Soar like a mighty dragon. They were not meant to be caged! (Where’s the sport in that?) © 2008 mrp/tpm

Terror’s teeth lunges for the leather whip that cracks the tense and shackled light. We’ve enough of that, screeches the slave. Feared enough, roars the wounded slave. Pity, you’re caged by your own foul tongue, captured by your will to stir darkness, spent of courage that would mock a fair beast sending what’s been dead for what hasn’t lived. What should we do with you, cries the slave. When shall we begin, shouts the bold slave. What shall we do with my fear, shrieks the master! Terror’s teeth pierces the sheath that houses the whip and sets free its trembling. © 2008 mrp/tpm

Scar Tissue and the F bomb Rage’s pretty white child has lost its teddy bear, it whose lips he knew and who hugged him tenderly. We’ve been witness to this foxtrot under the dimness of fear. Heard him cry “O! How I do love thee, my wooly god!” Heard him screech of the emptiness pounding his ears when no one thought to challenge the lopsided score. Throngs of emotion have dreamed of him wished his razor-sharp word would pierce their skin, the frowned face caked atop their melancholy mug as the cold flesh of emptiness left its unique scar. Now his followers madly grimace as truth tumbles down upon the soft rear of indifference… and babies cry. Rise up tender child! Bravely swim back to us through the red water and bone! Back to the asylum! Secret Order – Attack al Qaeda in many Countries Coming in low, over the streets, over flesh, coming to free their bandaged minds of such rumbling, terror plummets down as savior and Christ! Obama...

Iraq expects U.S. answer on pact A pact made out of petroleum ignites over the empty streets illuminating a path of sprinkled bone. US military chief visits Pakistan The boots on the ground alight striking the sand beneath them. A child cries out for father in the arid, dishonest air. Judge tells White House to release wiretapping docs Where have they been all these days? Wandering through infinite reams of law asking one another what it means to listen? Had they but done just that years ago. Republicans Scrambling to Save Seats in Congress My mind asks, perplexed, “Why do men not lead beforehand?” Ask the maggots oozing under the flesh do you eat more frantically before your hungry? Experts Question AIG Bailout They want to dissect the beast. Feed it our flesh until it bursts, revealing what we've always known. Iraq pledges $900K to help displaced Christians Odd is the noise this makes, loud, yet unlike the laden clang of mon...

They asked me to wait. To wait for God to come laughing, wait on His voice to destroy the golden temples of man, hold my tongue until His powerful breath was upon me, and from His loving casualties I’d at last know the Savior. They asked me to wait. To wait for God to come laughing, wait for His followers to die away their persuasive babble and the murder of Islam to breach the walls of the earth as the many damned souls drowned under holy laughter. “O! The Lord God is looming! On his way with God’s wrath! We are to take up swords and send evil howling back to die their well deserved and slow death! Their faces popped and spattered these words as they fell back, caught in His fiery presence, twisting their tongues into drivel and thrashing their minds in the glory of an Eden unlike any other. And then the snake planted his venom through the laughter of their gyrating madness. Tears emptied their pockets, spirits came crashing , and the anointed rapture of their making grew tire...