Hobbies - Poetry - Anonn
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After the Horror

    Is there an after?

    There certainly was a before
    will there ever be an after?
    How many generations will it take
    for the pain
    the rage
    the incomprehension to subside
    and make place for the after?

    Is it the right time to ask the question
    when the in-between
    is still here
    eating at our minds
    and fabric?

    I see the images
    I hear the voices
    and they claw at me
    and I crawl into myself and wait.
    I will probably stop waiting long before any after may dare ask for permission
    to be born.

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hey! you forgot me!

    The world falls apart, around me.
    The world falls apart inside me.
    I wonder if these two are independent or interdependent or intradependent.

    I was born several centuries ago (ask my body)
    and several seconds ago (ask my mind)
    and the twain shall battle and none shall win...
    I mean
    certainly the body will win in the end,
    it’s a bolts and nuts and rust world. The rest is Fata Morgana.

    I wonder why I keep wasting life resources,
    my usefulness and usability and usableness having reached an all-time low
    with nothing else in sight bar a new record-setting all-time low,
    record set to be broken soon.
    OK, so I breathe, big deal, so do so-and-so other billions.
    OK, so I curse, big deal, see above.
    OK, so I write mediocre poetry, big deal, see above.
    It’s probably time these resources are invested in better-return opportunities
    like politicians
    influencers
    lawyers... ha ha ha

    so whoever is responsible up/down/somewhere on such matters –
    hey! you forgot me!

    But He/She/It does not hear me
    busy as He/She/It is culling all those lives much shorter and greener than mine
    that keep parading in front of me
    through that rectangular hole in the time-space continuum
    called television.
    Blasphemy! I hear someone in the audience gasp,
    who knows there is a greater plan.
    Blasphemy, I acquiesce,
    knowing the word to be meaningless and the absence of a greater plan.

    And yet, from time to time I still find myself screaming My God!
    before the dams collapse.

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Nir Oz, 2023

    The kids ran excitedly from room to room
    skipping over the litter on the floor...
    Hey, mom, this looks like a flower...
    Hey, mom, this looks like sun, but I do it yellow...
    Mom, this is a strange rainbow, only one color, red...

    She stifled the scream bubbling inside her,
    kids...
    they run
    skip
    gaze in wonder at splotches that were once blood in the veins of their father...

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Nir Oz, 2023, two

    They shot his mom.

    They shot his pop
    they shot his dog
    they shot his gramps
    they shot his friend, his other friend, his sister.

    Everybody called the shooters monsters,
    he didn’t understand why everybody called them monsters
    he played with monsters every day
    monsters were nice
    monsters never shot anybody,
    now his monsters lay also trampled on the floor
    caked in the blood of his mom, his pop, his dog, his gramps,
    his friend,
    his other friend,
    his sister... he always hated his sister
    now he suddenly missed his sister,

    he started crying.

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Architect

    He didn’t like playing with the plastic building blocks of a certain brand,
    he didn’t like playing with the nylon-haired dolls of a certain different brand,
    he didn’t like playing with the battery-based games of yet another brand.
    He liked playing with plain wooden blocks, not even painted.
    He will grow into an ecological person, said his mother,
    probably an architect, she added, proudly.

    They identified him, with limited certainty,
    due to a partially calcinated wooden block
    held tight in a partially calcinated hand
    attached to a partially calcinated body they found.
    He will not grow into an ecological person, probably an architect, anymore.
    I only hope they shot him first, sobbed his grandmother
    before collapsing.

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TV

    Picture 1

    The elected representatives in the elected house of the elected nation
    scratch and bite and curse and threaten and bicker inside and outside
    and I feel like sending hands through the TV window
    and strangling them one by one, most of them,
    and then cleaning the house to zero and electing normal people.
    Normal... is there such a thing?
    Wherefrom all this wicked wickedness?

    Picture 2

    The TV frames people walking quietly between leftovers of walls
    of gardens
    of beds
    picking up a blackened souvenir that chanced to burn only partially
    reminiscing of neighbors that were
    of family members that were
    of planned parties, weddings, family meals that will not be anymore
    and I feel like walking alongside them and screaming.

    Picture 3

    Rectangular holes in the ground just the right shape for the TV eye
    and some silent some sobbing some petrified locking regards with the white sheet
    being lowered to the bottom of that one way pit,
    meaningless words spoken into microphones,
    a torment that will forever be part of their lives
    and I feel like howling and raging and willing to be there and die with everyone around.

    Picture 4

    Hundreds, thousands, complete strangers
    gathering inside and outside the TV lens

    feeding others
    laundering for others
    cleaning for others
    taking care of others
    wonderful people, hundreds of thousands
    and I feel like dancing and singing
    and the few bastards here and there cannot keep out of the heart
    the elation, the beauty, the pride of calling them all – brothers.

    Picture 5

    Name... died.
    Name... wounded.
    Name... kidnapped.
    Name... unknown.
    Name... how many more definitions can there be
    written on the faces and in the words of those left behind hoping, knowing, waiting?
    White panels, black names, colored faces
    filling the TV screen and overflowing on all sides
    and I feel like tearing them all to pieces, throwing them all into a cauldron
    and making an incantation that will turn the wheel of time to the moment... before.
    Which will not happen. And it tears me to pieces.

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How do you dare?

    How do you dare judge me?

    Were your walls blown, broken, torn with you inside?
    Was your sick father kidnapped to the depths of dark unmedicated hell?
    Was your sister raped, maimed, murdered while raping and maiming were happening?
    Was your baby boy shot in the head and burned, hopefully in this sequence?
    Did your friends and neighbors go through the same ordeal?
    Probably they didn’t, probably you don’t have friends, you shouldn’t have friends.
    Did you watch the horrors of decapitation, torture, screams
    against the background of mean laughter and religious nonsense slogans?
    Did you these and more like these?

    And you judge me? How dare you?

    Hostis humani generis is them,
    did you join them?

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The Eleventh Plague

    I don’t laugh anymore at Charlie Chaplin. I cannot.
    I cannot also at Harold Lloyd, Laurel & Hardy, Buster Keaton, Norman Wisdom.
    And others.
    Once I filled cinema halls with rolling laughter,
    once. Before.
    Before I was told of raped, maimed, burnt alive, beheaded,
    kidnapped while not yet one year old.
    Before I started being told of “he was 24 years old”
    or “he was 35 years old”
    or “he left wife and two daughters”
    before no day passed without one or two or more Job messages
    before I started to count down myself too the time left for those under the ground
    sick
    terrified
    tortured. Alive?

    I don’t laugh anymore, I stopped laughing.
    When will I laugh again? Danny Kaye? Marx Brothers? Ever?

    Oh, what a befitting eleventh plague it would be
    for God to banish laughter from this world forever.
    Oh, what befitting...

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Resilience

    We are resilient.

    The cactus is resilient.
    Stainless steel is resilient.
    Faith is resilient.

    Resilient, but not invincible.

    We should temper our resilience with a bit of humility.
    The way of a cactus with a few well-administered drops of water
    of steel with a few well-weighed milligrams of carbon
    of true faith, with a few well-placed question marks.

    Oh... and ego, arrogance, conceit have nothing to do with resilience,
    they are rot, rust, idolatry.

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Blankets

    I pulled the blanket over my head
    and I knew that nothing could ever hurt me
    protected by my blanket and the mighty hand of my all-powerful father
    resting on it.
    I was a child, then.

    Years passed
    brutally trying and mightily failing to take away the child in me
    safe as I was under my blanket and in my knowledge.

    Then the sudden bark of AK-47s spit death at them
    penetrating the might of their blankets
    and the mighty hands of their all-powerful fathers.
    Rending my childhood.
    Rending their tiny lives.

    I started screaming.

    Still do.

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Family

    God,
    I did not know I have so many brothers.

    The Argentinian, the Ukrainian, the Ethiopian, the French,
    the Orthodox, the Atheist, the Leftist, the Rightist, the Accountant,
    the Falafelseller, the Student, the Programmer, the Designer, the Teacher,
    the Druze, the Bedouin, the Female, the Transgender, the Oncedrugged,
    the Midget, the Shy, the Loudmouth, the Singer, the Magician, the Kibbutznik,
    the Divorcee, the Freshlymarried, the SomanyothersIfailtomention.
    The Human. Brothers. My brothers.
    So many there. So many not there anymore. An overflowing heart.
    A giant hole in the heart.

    Sure, statistics oblige, I have also some horrible brothers...
    the Drizella, the Gargamel, the Lucreziaborgia and similar.
    Wonder I hate statistics?
    But I run double strikethrough through these. Tfu tfu tfu!

    Sun Tzu was wrong. Keep your friends close and your brothers closer!
    I have a thousand brothers and more.
    Concrete. Steel. Diamond.

    God,
    now I know.

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Camera

    The pitiless camera eye
    remembers everything, reminds everything
    all the while throwing at us slices of hell.

    The blackened wall.
    The collapsing mother.
    The uncomprehending father, child, sibling, wife. Widow.
    The warrior tears.
    The brit before the funeral, the brit after the funeral.
    The bloodied paramedic.
    The song. Hope. Loss. Wish.
    The arrogant. The realist. The one who cares for himself, the one who cares for all.
    The waiting of the interminable wait and the sleepless nights and the rage.
    The funeral, another one, no brit. They cannot take it anymore but they take it.
    The hug.
    The teenage girl hanging on to a father she hasn’t seen for ninety days like a leech
    like a hyena bite
    like Earth’s gravitation to the moon.
    The thirsty stray dog.

    Streets paved with shreds of hearts.
    The camera sees it all, the lens cracks. Even the lens has a pain limit.

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Mistakes

    Mistakes.
    Horrible, heart wrenching mistakes
    culling sons, fathers, husbands, sisters, brothers... siblings all, mine.

    A hero, saving lives.
    Fugitives, miraculously just escaped.
    Hard working, hard as flint-stones comrades laying foundations of never again.
    Tattered tears in the fabric of society
    never healing wounds in the flesh of those who made the mistake
    hurting, howling words like why
    why not
    what if
    sorry
    damn... damn... damn!

    Oh, the nightmare of mistakes past,
    the hope of never again.

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Smiling

    Smiling.
    One leg amputated below the knee.
    Smiling.
    Both legs amputated above the knees.
    Smiling.
    One eyed.
    Smiling.
    Body riddled pieces of iron... neck close to artery, chest close to heart, spine.
    Smiling.
    “Hey, I’m fine, my hand is left behind, how are you?”

    Not heroes. Brothers. Humans to be admired, respected, venerated.
    Not to be forgotten when remembering becomes embarrassing
    and forgetting fashionable, the easy way out.
    They gave everything, they are entitled to everything in return.
    From us all.

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Child

    My child, 5 years old, said she, said he.
    My child, 15 years old said she, another she, said he, another he.
    My child, 35 years old, said another she, her he having passed away.
    My child, said others.

    Is there an age to a child,
    when does a child stop being a child, someone’s child, does it happen ever?

    Children, all of them children, missing in a family’s womb,
    all the pain levels equal. Infinite.

    Why do the bad guys know it,
    why do the good guys not know it?

    I want my child back! screams the parent to the 5, the 15, the 35, the rest,
    no lofty words, please,
    just my child, please!

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Redefined (or Science Fiction)

    Those who died
    died.

    Those who live
    die every day.

    Therefore those who claim what they claim are justified to claim what they claim.
    It is a land of apartheid after all,
    just... slightly redefined.

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Pure

    Pure.

    She was pure.

    A bud about to open into a flower
    a snowflake ready to melt into a drop of rain
    a word on its way to metamorphose into a full poem.

    The one who befouled her with his bodily refuse younger than her.

    She is still a bud, a snowflake, a word,
    she will never evolve into the next stage of her life.
    Pure.
    Forever.

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A Day

    A day.
    Another day.
    Another day.
    Another days.
    A week.
    A weeks.
    A month.
    A months...
    Oh, God, don’t let it be a year, a years.

    I watch them hollow cheeked, hollow-eyed
    irises lost in depths of cavities that were once the gates to their souls
    now the gates to their hells,
    individual hells with a mantra so often visiting their words
    that it almost lost its meaning...
    “their time runs away, there’s no more sand in their hourglass, bring them home!...”
    the bring them home! more of a prayer than an order
    groping at the sacrosanct tradition of none left behind,
    of Kol Yisrael Arevim Zeh La Zeh
    holier than the holiest, holier than the ten commandments,
    holier than the first commandment itself,

    a prayer falling on oznayim arelot...
    how else would you call it
    when virtual survival of the one takes precedence over the physical survival of kol Yisrael?
    A kol Yisrael that those rotting in an unknown hell are it.

    I watch the hollow eyes of those waiting
    and read there the desperation of unknowing...
    hungry? freezing? wounded? sick? insane? pregnant?... alive?
    the silent scream which I join,
    that anyone with one millionth of a cockroach’s conscience should join
    the desperation that could... should?... lead to a revolution
    the likes of the French or the October or even the Arab Spring
    and turn the single citizen from being the last in the food chain
    to being the first in the food chain.

    But revolutions eventually lead to corruption
    and politics eventually lead to politicians
    and those hollow eyes stay hollow
    while those being awaited rot in the uncertainties of the same hell.

    God, where are you?

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Interview

    Between life and death.

    Young
    handsome
    life won the battle paying a heavy tribute to death for its right to win,
    heavily handicapped for the rest of his days.

    His friends fared better,
    lucky fellows.

    “Would you swap places with them?” asked him the interviewer.
    He smiled shyly, tears filling his eyes.
    “No way! They are my friends,” he answered.

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Zola

    Cripple.
    OK, in line with politically correct fashion – disabled.
    As if she cares
    half body dysfunctional
    the second half being pulled into dysfunctionality by the first half
    and some busybodies playing name games for her uncaring ears.
    Cripple, she prefers, sticking her tongue out (still works)
    and returning to what she really cares about. The news. TV.
    Those who were taken and those who die trying to get to those who were taken
    and her own private condition and rolling prison irrelevant
    as she watches from early morning to late evening hoping to see a “deal”.
    Every day.
    Is there a deal already? she asks first thing in the morning
    before anything else.
    Poor brothers of mine, poor sisters of mine, never “poor me”, and her eyes well with tears
    once someone quotes the horrible “it was allowed to be made public, fallen today...”

    Never in her life, before or after cripple invaded her life, did she curse,
    not even a simple “hell” or “damn”,
    only smiles, only blessings, only softness.
    And suddenly this untypical hardness in her regard, in her voice,
    suddenly discovering the power of curses as she threshes any and all
    who “don’t do enough to bring them home”
    who “send our children to death”
    who “brought this scourge upon us”.
    Forgiving and forgetting none of those involved
    irrelevant sex, political orientation, faith, race, nationality.
    Saturdays lighting Shabbat candles with her one partially functioning hand
    her first candle and her first prayer going always to those who suffer “there”
    to those who die “there”
    to those that join her cripple world “there”,
    never forgetting them
    and only the last prayer after many is for herself, sometimes even forgetting this one.

    Again, in front of the TV. Watching. Eagle eyed.
    Suddenly she identifies one of those involved in “them still being there”

    and raises a solid though trembling finger toward the screen
    almost succeeds getting up on dead feet
    and with a chocked voice hisses Zola-wise straight at the target of her rage:
    I accuse!

    Night.
    A restless sleep.
    Tomorrow another day of vigil.
    Is there a deal already? Her first words with morning, her mantra,
    oh, how I wish she was the one decision maker who has to decide the decision.
    She would have cut the Gordian knot.
    “They” would have been home today.

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Not before

    Nations
    have short memories,
    they prefer to forget.

    People
    have short memories,
    they prefer to forget.

    Some people
    all they are left with
    are memories.
    Sure they will forget,
    when the bliss of that last eyeblink, last heartbeat, last breath
    gratifies them with its presence.
    Not before.

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Instinct

    They want to kill me.
    I don’t want to kill them.

    It’s the knee jerk reaction to the hammer
    the blinking eyelids to an approaching hand
    the shudder to a sudden noise

    Instinct.
    Self-defense.
    No hate, no conquest, no desire.
    Just the primal self-preservation of I and mine,
    born before the human race was even an idea.

    Modern world
    modern threats
    modern means
    and the hammer the hand the noise are bullets and bombs
    and the jerk and the blink and the shudder are bullets and bombs.

    All I do is protect I and mine.
    Instinct.
    Leave me alone.
    You want to kill me.
    I don’t want to kill you.

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Tired

    The chief of state is tired, for the wrong reason.
    The ministers are tired, they were never interested.
    The soldiers are tired, they have their own families to care for.
    The population is tired
    split
    the artificial gap between an artificial left and an artificial right deepening
    like a cavity in a tooth, faster.
    The media is tired, reality pulls attention in other directions.
    The world is tired, hypocrite, brainwashed, bigot, duplicitous, sanctimonious.
    The families are tired, desperate.

    They
    are not tired.
    They rot and die.

    Did I forget anyone

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Brothers?

    I have some lost brothers.
    I have some strange brothers that don’t give a damn about my lost brothers.
    Their lost brothers.
    Their brothers.

    They carved a corner in this ball we live on
    and all thy care is this corner and the rest of the world can go to hell.
    Inclusive my lost brothers.
    Their lost brothers.
    Their brothers.

    Guess what?
    The world is not ready to go to hell
    and neither I to see my lost brothers go to hell.

    And if the hell they believe in awaits
    they will find it first-hand.
    Then they will remember my lost brothers they forgot.
    Their lost brothers.
    Their brothers.

    There is a judging God, and none better than them knows it,
    get ready for His judgement, strange brothers.
    Strangers.

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Wishes

    There is a metal sculpture in Brussels
    touch it and your wishes will be fulfilled.
    It is shiny from the many fingers.
    And it works. Statistically.

    There is a fountain in Rome
    throw a coin into it and your wishes will be fulfilled.
    There was almost no place for the water from the coins.
    And it works. Statistically.

    There is a bridge in Paris
    hang a lock on it and your wishes will be fulfilled.
    It almost collapsed from the weight of locks.
    And it works. Statistically.

    There is a candles holder in my home.
    Light the Shabbat candles and make a wish and God will fulfill it.
    My wife lost her voice from wishes of bring them home
    no more wounded
    no more dead
    peace
    and other.
    It does not work. Not even statistically.
    I would have expected that, irrelevant that God does not exist,
    God would have come into existence just due to such fervor in her words.
    She does not give up, she was never too good in math.

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The List

    I got the list, somehow.
    Somebody somehow got the list and I got the list too. From somebody. Somehow.

    Father of one.
    Father of five.
    Almost father of.
    Brother of.
    Son of.
    Son of.
    Son of. So many son of, all of them sons of.
    Surprise... surprise? Daughter of. Sister of, mother of, aunt of.
    Surprise... surprise? Child of. Baby of.
    I go down the list not willing to lose even one letter,
    so long, terribly long the list.
    I don’t have the other list, even terribly longer
    of those who still are
    still are still marked
    for life.
    I don’t want to have the other list
    I don’t want to have any list
    I don’t want to read,
    I keep reading.

    I tremble. Why the hell do I tremble?
    Why the hell don’t I tremble more?

    I finish the list. Close it.
    Mine, all of them mine.
    Ours.
    Will the pain ever ease?

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Question

    Why the one hundred plus,
    why not the one thousand plus?
    asks me an on-line interlocutor,
    nameless, faceless, sexless, just an avatar. So I will call my interlocutor it.

    Because the one thousand plus are gone
    and left for us the hell to live in, I answer it.
    No one can do anything about them anymore except honor them
    by keeping our hell alive with their memory.

    Because the one hundred plus are not gone
    and they are the ones living in hell, I answer it.
    Everyone must do everything about them
    by ending their living hell before they too become subjects we honor
    and join the one thousand plus
    who are already our hell and our memory.

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Counting

    I open the TV,
    let them do the counting.
    They never miss, their arithmetic impeccable.

    One more day.
    One more day since the incredible became fact
    and the credible lost all meaning
    and I am one more year older... how old am I today?
    One cannot be all these years and still be alive, can one?

    Will tomorrow be one more day, one year older?
    Probably it will,
    until when will it?

    I do not listen,
    I let them babble and bicker and bitch in the background
    some inevitable jokes grating my skin palm deep
    a few publicity spots selling happiness at irrelevant prices
    a couple shows... sure, life goes on.
    Death goes on too, another name adds itself to the list,
    that miserable list that keeps getting longer and longer.
    I guess one day there will be wall with all the names sculpted inside its granite,
    I hope it will be a small wall
    I don’t know if it will be a small wall.

    At a certain stage I mute the moving pictures machine
    and let the colors play shadows on the walls,
    not that the color is beautiful,
    colors stopped being beautiful
    they are just a physical manifestation of electromagnetic waves
    and wave-lengths
    and Einstein stuff.
    Beauty is gone from the color.
    Beauty is gone from the world.

    What is left is barking TNT
    and barking politicians
    and barking religious preachers
    and. God, how I miss the beautiful barking of my gone dogs
    so incredibly melodic when compared to the TNT and politicians and religious preachers.

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My Mother. My Father.

    My mother would have been one hundred plus, if she lived.
    My father would have been one hundred plus plus, if he lived.

    My mother would have wished herself dead, if she saw what happens today.
    My father, who could not have lived one day without my mother,
    would have wished to join her, in death.

    My mother would have offered herself hostage, to replace “them”, there, in hell.
    My father, who could not have lived one day without my mother,
    would have wished to join her, there, in hell exile.

    My mother was Hashomer Hatzair.
    My father was Bethar.
    Our household was built on two rules: love and hard work.
    Simple people. Hardly educated.
    With life’s wisdom greater than life, with compassion for all greater than all.
    Simple people. Great people. Caring people. Humanity incarnated.

    I wish my mother lived today, even one hundred plus.
    I wish my father lived today, even one hundred plus plus.
    The world would have been a better place
    certainly there where no-goods keep no-gooding.
    I know the pain of losing love, first hand.
    I know the pain of those there who lost “them”, who fear for “them”,
    I have lived it first hand
    yet, those waiting, live it first-hand tenfold. Hundredfold?

    Mother, father, I don’t believe in God,
    mother father, please have a word with God. Please.

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Plan

    He had it all planned,
    the ring was bought
    the place where he would kneel was decided
    the words he would say were rehearsed,

    he did not plan that he would be kidnapped.

    Now the secret is out,
    she will not be surprised anymore, someone told her of his plan.
    I do not care, just come home, please come home,
    she prays every night now for one hundred days and more,
    her heart a rose shedding a petal every day.
    Who could have known a rose would hold so many petals?

    He will return, I know he will return,
    she ends the interview turning her back to the camera.
    She knows, she really knows.

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There is

    They raped my country,
    my mother. Also other mothers.

    They raped my country’s daughters,
    my sisters. Also other sisters.

    They raped my country’s daughters’ children,
    my children. Also other children.

    They continue raping everything in their way
    and the rapists’ mothers and sisters and children cheer them on,
    and no one understands why I am angry?

    If their mothers or sisters or children would have been raped
    they would have killed them.
    I want to save my mothers, my sisters, my children, to comfort them.
    Is there a difference between us?
    Damn hell, there is!
    Does no one understand?

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Save them!

    Killed.
    Murdered.
    Wounded.
    Maimed.
    Tortured.
    Raped.
    Kidnapped.
    Traumatized.
    Any combination or permutation allowed.
    Some still alive.
    Some dead.
    Choose your number to replace the some.

    There are those who call them victims.
    There are those who call them heroes.
    There are those for whom horror is synonym to banality, who call them casualties.
    There are those who don’t give a damn about them though they should,
    whatever they are called.
    There are those who would give their lives for them, and they do. Daily.
    There are those who hide behind slogans.

    Then there are those thriving on the blood making money
    shuffling political positions
    clinging like leeches to their bureaucratic habits of before
    selling meaningless salvation and promoting hilarious ideas...
    ha, it would have been hilarious if it would not have been so tragic...

    And, then, there are those who follow their leaders
    brain dead
    brainwashed
    brainless.

    And all above for the good guys side. Words for the other side were not invented yet.

    Killed.
    Murdered.
    Wounded.
    Maimed.
    Tortured.
    Raped.
    Kidnapped.
    Traumatized.
    I call them worlds. Others do so too. Worlds lost or about to be lost.
    Thus, God, please disregard the fact that I do not believe in you,
    please save those worlds still alive!
    Thus, leaders of the nation, please disregard the fact that I do not believe in you,
    please save those worlds still alive!
    Save them! All!

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Crying

    Hey Satan, you’re sighing?
    Seraphs, do you cuss?
    And God, are you crying for ours and us?

    You are so big, so powerful, you certainly can cry much longer than humans,
    those humans who are crying here for those dying there
    those who should be crying here for those dying there and do not
    those who should be crying here or else be kicked out of their chairs
    but are not crying here and for mysterious reasons are not kicked out of their chairs.
    While those dying there keep dying there.

    How long can a human cry?
    Mostly for a lifetime,
    not the lifetime of the one dying but the lifetime of the one crying.
    But you – Satan, seraphs, God, you can cry for longer than that.

    Hey Satan, you’re sighing?
    Seraphs, do you cuss?
    And God, are you crying for ours and us?

    If you do not, then you do not exist.

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Unsaid

    Young
    and not so young,
    bold and beautiful, not always beautiful but always bold,

    proud to be chosen,
    not proud to be chosen by death
    but proud to be chosen to reach for the life of others.

    Until culled mid-life, or before.

    Sounds mawkish, trite?
    Tell it to those left behind by those young and not so young
    bold and beautiful, not always beautiful but always bold.

    So many worthy ways to write a eulogy
    I found none,
    none exists.
    The unsaid words, these are the only eulogy worth having
    and only those unsaying them know them.
    The rest is, well, disintegrating dry leaves dissipating in a tempest.

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Presence

    I was there.
    Died.
    Was kidnapped.
    Got traumatized.

    I am there.
    Dying.
    Being kidnapped.
    Getting traumatized.

    I will be there.
    To die again
    to be kidnapped again
    to get traumatized again.

    Until when?

    This is not a terminal, chronic sickness,
    this is an open, festering, suppurating wound infesting an entire nation
    that can be cured with a single cure-all panacea.

    If only those holding the cure would remember for a moment
    that they are part of the nation.

    Waiting.

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And yet...

    For a family of ten million odd members
    one is sure to find the odd odd-ball, ha-ha, even more than one,
    for every letter of the alphabet if you try hard (no too hard) enough
    like for a you have the asshole, the arrogant, the abuser
    for b the bastard, the batty, the bloodthirsty
    for c the crackpot, the chauvinist, the cruel
    and so on all the way to z
    zany, zestless, zonked...

    And yet, scrap away this opulent layer of dirt and dust and dung
    and the shining golden nugget lies just underneath -
    the artist
    the brave
    the creative...
    all the way to the zesty.
    My real, down to earth family
    those who build, those who protect, those who sing, those who caress.
    Those who care.
    My family, the soul of this nation in progress, in pain, in peace. Yes, in battle too.
    I love you.

    *

    PS It is not that I am suddenly happy,
    it is that I saw the first butterfly of this spring. And this gives me hope.
    Re-birth.

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Hand

    You lent them your hand.

    It was a supporting hand, a tending hand

    medical
    economical
    hey... it was a friendship’s hand.

    And they bit it,
    they ripped it.
    Who bites a feeding hand?

    No, not a dog.
    A rabid dog.

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Hollow

    They sound hollow this time
    the cheers.

    The songs sung in the wrong keys
    the fireworks’ fuses wet
    the laughter forced...

    canned laughter
    this is the word I was looking for,
    canned laughter.

    There should be no cheers
    this time around.

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The Truth

    So they did not accept to publish my poetry
    those whoevers.

    I guess they found it too disturbing?
    Too close to the truth?
    Too close to the painful truth that some are still denying?

    Yes, society may be split,
    truth may not. There is just one.

    No worry, I will find a solution,
    I will tell my truth.
    The truth.

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