A bit of you, a bit of me
A bit of them and more.
We’re all just little morsels
On the smorgasbord of war.
Everyone is mixed together
Like ingredients in a stew.
It’s hard to tell the different flavors.
I’ll just hope it isn’t you.
Who’ll ever know we went to war
If you never really call it one.
Just call it a small conflict
And tidy up when you are done.
We only want a little war,
A sip, a dash, a smidge, a drop.
And when we’ve tasted just a bit of blood
We’ll tell the war to stop.
Just treat it like a virus.
Just let it run its course.
And when enough of youth are dead,
We’ll offer some remorse.
We all just want a clean war
Without the dirt and grime.
In the safety of TV screens,
We keep our distance from the crime.
www.infinitecreation.net
BACK TO TOP
The Burden of Robert Strange McNamara
In 1945, he helped kill 100,000 Tokyo civilians in one nightAnd later destroyed 17 major Japanese cities
Before dropping the atomic bombs On Hiroshima and Nagasaki
This killed a quarter million more
And why is this not a war crime he asks the camera rhetorically?
We won, is his reply almost not believing his own words
As he recalls the violence he participated in while still only in his mid 20's
Then off to Ford Motor Co where he invented the seat belt and
Became the company president
Kennedy needed a whiz kid with an Irish name
So McNamara became the Secretary of Defense
Only to oversee the death of hundreds of thousands more in Vietnam
Do we recoil at the staggering amount of death at the hands of one man?
No, President Johnson gave him the highest civilian honor:
The Medal of Freedom
A tarnished medal, forever
Is this the reward we should bestow on such killers?
Death by government or death by criminals;
It makes no difference to the dead
Did "we" really win in any of McNamara's exploits?
Brilliant yet conflicted
A couple of different twists of fate and you could have been great
And that is what you wanted isn't it?
How heavy is that medal?
2006
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War!
You withhold freedom
While concealing
The disturbing
Truth and reasoning
Strife!
You hold back our rights
Eliminate who we were
Give the vulgar aristocrats
Profit at the cost of lives
Battle!
You're only a tool
To manipulate others
To mess peoples' minds
Destroy peoples' families
Antagonism!
You cannot defend us
Against Terrorism
For you are a terrorist
Destroying the world
Destruction!
You cannot understand Peace
For she thinks differently
Respecting peoples' lives
Having a better goal
Wage Peace!
Flang B. Gemring a.k.a. Dylan Emrys Hand-Boniakowski
BACK TO TOP
The Imperial Hand Visits Baltimore
I saw George Bush's hand this week
up close, impeccably dressed.
It was on Fayette Street
in a Cadillac heading west
in a phalanx of motorcycle cops and
SUVs full of guys with sunglasses.
There were two identical Caddys,
flags flapping on the fenders,
so if my protest sign is really a bomb
I won't know where to throw it.
The faces were invisible behind armor and tinted windows,
but the hand reached forward from the back seat and waved at us
standing across from the VA Hospital and
sitting across from the VA Hospital
in wheelchairs.
The Caddy windows were closed and the AC was going
so the hand couldn't hear the boos
or see the guy in scrubs giving it the finger.
Al McKegg
2006
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THESE COLORS DON'T CUT AND RUN:
Inspired by the film "Why We Fight."
These colors don't cut and run.
These colors never question our,
Commander and Chief.
Red, white, and blue runs through our veins.
Our country right or wrong.
Blind patriotism is our motto.
These colors don't cut and run.
These colors do not question right or wrong,
These colors blindly follow our elected leaders.
These colors have a never ending reservoir,
of young men and women,
to put on the front lines.
These colors have a never ending class,
of graduates from the military academes,
to blindly put them there.
These colors now have a professional military.
This county now has a,
Military Industrial Complex;
of parasites, feeding on war.
Dear Hearts: President Eisenhower,
was so right, in his last speech.
We have become our own enemy.
We have become;
The United States of the
Industrial Military complex.
Janice Josephine Carney
Author of "Purple Hearts and Silver Stars"
www.xlibris.com/PurpleHeartsandSilverStars.html
SP/5 US Army 1969 / 1972
Vietnam July 70 / July 1971
100% service connected disabled.
BACK TO TOP
Cold Beer in Texas
Yes!
Today
At the age of fifty-five
I had a cold beer in Texas
a simple
insignificant event
a cold beer
on a hot Texas afternoon
A cold beer
In Texas
On a hot Texas afternoon
Back then
When the Vietnam War
Was raging
I had a cold beer
In Texas
And I was arrested
I was told that
"I was a good ole boy
"serving my county and all"
But I was breaking the law
A cold beer in Texas
For a nine-teen year old
Was illegal
I drank quite
a few warm beers
On hot Vietnamese afternoons
At the age of nineteen
I guess that was legal
I was twenty years old
The next time
I tried to buy a
Cold beer in Texas
At an airport in Texas
Back from Vietnam
Still a good ole boy
Serving his country
No cold beer Texas
I still was under age
But thanks
For being a good ole boy
And serving your country
A cold beer in Texas
On a hot Texas afternoon
at the age of fifty-five
A insignificant event
I sit and wonder
How many good ole boys
Coming home from Iraq
Are too young
To sip a cold beer
On a hot Texas afternoon
I wonder how many good ole boys
Are wondering through the Texas airport
With that same
Sad look
that are crying inside
Holding back a sea of tears
Just asking for a cold beer
On a hot Texas afternoon
( c \}JJ Carney
Sp/5 Us army Vietnam 1970/71
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WRITTEN THE NIGHT OF MY FIRST TRIP TO THE WALL
The night is hauntingly quiet, the sky bright, and alive. The bronze soldiers, one with a tear in his eye, come alive in the night. The grounds of grass, which they watch over, belong to the dead; as well as the living Veterans of the Vietnam War, in the loneliness of the night.
My anger still exists at the walls creator, as I look over a dark hole in the ground. As I inch closer and closer to the wall, keeping the memory of the lost souls of the Vietnam War alive. My knees start to shake.
A few inches of the ground the first lettered name appears on the black marble wall. It is the name of the last American Solder to die in Vietnam. The white lettered name stares back at me in the quiet of the night.
The reverse walk through Vietnam grows with the wall in the darkness of the night. The wall itself becomes alive in the warm night air. The black marble growing out of Mother Earth. The white names on black marble panel, after panel. Year after year after year. Name after name after name!
At the center of the wall two arches reach into the sky: The years 1959, 1975 look down at you the beginning and the end of the war. The war that still haunts my nights. In the clear stillness of the night I confront the black marble panels. The black marble panels reaching up into the night sky. The black marble panels, with there seemingly never ending list of names, from 1970-1971.
As I walk through the early years of the war, my main thought is: "It is best that I keep my emotions to myself." I reach the beginning of the wall, and I face the name of the first one of us to die in the war. At this point I redirect my anger,
I realize now that this memorial buried deep into the landscape of Washington soil, reaches deep into the soul of the creator of the wall. It is not an attempt to save the landscape of old Washington DC.
I see now what she visioned; the pain of the war lives on. Some how she has managed to see inside the souls of Vietnam Veterans.
My anger turns to question, why, why why,! Why did this wall have to be built? 1959 to 1975 was a long time. A lot of gutless presidents and legislators, my anger against them will never go away! I am somewhat glowing in the night. I know now that these names will live on never to be forgotten. A short dark path of America in a shadow of a wall that all Americans should walk.
Janice Josephine Carney,
served in Vietnam July 1970 - July 1971
as John Joseph Carney
Do It!
As the New Year approaches do you take
heart in your belief things must get better
because how could they get any worse?
Or do you put such thoughts out of mind
because of the oft heard lament: I'm just
one person - what can I do or accomplish?
I'm sixty-eight and I think of my legacy.
When they come of age what will my
grandsons know of me - my convictions?
Better to have tried and failed then to
not have tried at all. Tried what? But of
course, to abolish war and make this world
a better place for all.
Philip Reiss
2005
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Frogman Drowns off Grecian Coast
What did he say when they let him go?
was it so casual that none will even try to remember?
Such a boy, or man
should be allowed a few words,
one phrase:
(and excuse it if he choose a rash
or urgent manner of expression).
I did not know his face:
did you? Or you?
a blur of youth recalled:
only that;
a callow brightness
destined to diminish
with the sun's turnings.
Too much to live with now:
not being able to report
the color of his eyes,
the brilliance of his smile
at his last
magnificent moment.
The silent world
he so submissively
slipped into,
pretends to remain aloof,
not caring, perhaps.
Or did all, in fact
accept with some
kind indifference
his momentary resting there,
preferring to ignore
that he did not belong
in that murky realm.
Moving from that gloom,
a truth will out:
an awareness of his painful search
for recognition of
brave achievement:
intrepid athlete
caught in deep and
writhing weeds,
yet holding
with bursting lungs,
blurred memory
of orders dispatched
so many fathoms past.
The final signal
reached his Captain,
so far-above,
grim-faced,
accepting with candor
one more loss,
yet one more loss.
What would they comprehend,
the others, family,
and friends?
Waiting ones,
they little knew,
diminished as they were
by that enormous act:
his leaving.
And he,
so brutally alone,
so forced to achieve
the certain measure
of immortality
that was his due.
Janet C. Re'
2005
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A Criminal Matter
The submarine-base barracks are eerily empty;
So suddenly
the young, the strong,
all brave and special men
are summoned
in dark of night
to board the
gray and hulking vessel at water's edge,
to sail silently
out of sight
and into neocons'
illegal war.
On the hill
above,
Ellie's Gramboko Hotel dance-floor is
stunningly still;
the memoried mahogany bar
has no takers.
Bright and newly-tuned
steel drums stand
strangely silent.
Virgin island violated;
islanders bereft,
unrecoverable;
mortally
wounded:
Bush-whacked.
all.
[Aug. 2005. Dedicated with reverence and love to all my US Navy friends, UDT and SEAL teams, both "survivors" and those "honorable and illegally" absent.]
Janet C. Re'
2005
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Sixties Nostalgia
My heart grows weary as I see
Cat's "Peace Train" derailed from
an oil slicked track.
And I wonder if young women
today would say yes to men with
the courage to say no?
Please don't be victims of
testosterone poisoning too
and blinded by ribbons of red,
white, and blue!
Phil Reiss
2005
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Let Me Out
It's like
You just wanna
Go
To a
Place that's just
So
Different than
Where you're at
Now
But you
Are stuck here
Somehow
And it's
Like being in
Jail
With absolutely
No sort of
Bail
Just time
Passing you by
Tick
And you
Start to feel
Sick
Because you
Are trapped in
Society
But it's
One without any
Variety
Same day
No change in
Routine
What's life
remains to be
Seen
But you
Know it's not
This
And you
Take time to
Reminisce
About the
Life that you
Had
And sometimes
You feel real
Mad
That you
Are stuck here
Again
And you
Want it to
End
You want
To go back
Home
To be left
Alone
You're tired
Of seeing them
Die
You're tired
Of constantly wondering
Why
You want
There to be
Peace
So that
We leave the
Middle East
And go
Back to these
Places
And see
Those beautiful smiling
Faces
That we
Left behind to
Go
Here and
We need to
Know
That it's
All for some
Reason
Because if
Not we waste
Seasons
Apart from
Our own world
Again
We hopefully
are near the
End
It's time
To resume our
Life
And stop
With this unnecessary
Strife
Christina
2005
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Colors Run Down My Face
stand tall and proud
your forefathers have died
fight for a cause
your being wants to deny
can only feel the truth now
blinded by unjust reasoning
stuck and disbelieving
ashamed of the clothes you wear
pride disappearing
children dying
stand tall
can see through them all
propaganda and denial
see the world in another light
1 2 3 4 what are we fighting for
political agendas keep the score
destruction for your sons to bear
colors run down my face
cant help but to feel disgrace
a country in the dark
pray away another day
die for a cause you don't believe in
never any rhyme or reason
war continues thru another season
thicker skin for we will win
the game of treason
fellow soldiers misguided
only with good intentions
they fight the good war that
will never change what's in store.
Christine Meyer
2005
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No second thoughts
No hesitation
No warning
No empathy
No remorse
No rethinking
No revision
No apology
No Harry Truman
No accolades
from me
Phil Reiss
2004
BACK TO TOP
Sam King
2003
BACK TO TOP
Report to Fox News
Thomas J. Scheff
Sifting through the rubble of war
I have been searching for the names of the maimed and the dead.
Not hard work for the US/UK casualties,
There are hundreds of names.
Their full names are given in many sites.
We know who they are, and that they are dead.
We can honor them, even if they died in vain.
Or worse.
But for Iraqis, I pull up only numbers,
Thousands of numbers, with the likely date of death.
On my own, I have been unable to find a single name.
Without names, they have vanished from this earth,
Unknown, unhonored, without a trace.
But with the help of a friend, I have found two names, both children.
The first is Ali Ishmail Abbas, a 12 year old, who lived in Zafaraniya
A village thirty miles from Bagdhad,
With his parents, his brother, sisters, and cousins.
On an April night, as the family slept,
A US rocket killed both parents, the brother, and some of the cousins,
And set fire to the house.
Ali and his sisters were only wounded.
I would reprint the photo of Ali here,
Taken as he lays in the hospital
His head, the stumps of his arms, and his lower body,
Covered in bandages.
But his attempt to smile for the photographer
Might break your heart, or turn you to stone.
Ali was burned by the fire as he lay unconscious
Both arms were amputated to save his life.
He has third-degree burns over 60 per cent of his body.
Because of the possibility of infection, his chance of survival is only 50-50.
He has lost his father, his mother, his brother, some of his cousins,
And both of his arms. He also may lose his life.
He told the reporter:
If I had hands, I would shake your hand.
They cut them off after the bomb.
I want my hands.
The second name is Fouad Abu Haidar, who lay in another ward
Of the same hospital. An 11-year-old, he has lost an arm, half his face
Covered by bandages, and he may lose one eye.
Like Ali, he was maimed by a US missile that struck his home
In Iskaniriyah, south of Baghdad at 9 at night.
His 14-year old cousin, Karim, died in the attack.
I must speak to them, I must say
I know you are only little boys, and you already bear
On your small shoulders far too many burdens.
Can you bear one more, can you represent the unnamed
Iraqis dead or maimed in our war against you?
I am thinking not just of the most recent attack,
But also the First Gulf War, and the years of sanctions between.
And our culpability for arming and inciting Iraq against Iran.
Can two names stand for a million or more?
You honorable people at Fox News,
I hope you can work this report,
Into your busy schedule
Of reporting a Fourth of July war.
Tom Scheff
2004
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On the Pier
Sundays the tourists, seeking pleasure, stroll on the Santa Barbara pier.
We veterans have put up a temporary memorial to our soldiers
Who have died in the war against Iraq: a cemetery with nearly a thousand crosses.
Installing it Sunday mornings, taking it down Sunday nights.
Laid out like a real graveyard, it covers a large part of the beach.
We are in the sand beside the pier, talking with those who stop.
Most either don't look at the crosses, or give them only a sidelong glance.
Many, however, stop, looking first at the crosses then at the books of the dead
That we have installed on our own railing, beside the rail of the pier.
Then they look at me, puzzled. "Which war?" they say. Iraq, I say.
Which war!
Some leave at that point. Most, however, look again at the names of the dead.
What's the purpose? To honor our dead. I say. They then look long at the crosses.
I can see in their faces what they are feeling. They are surprised and shocked.
Their thought can be expressed by a line from a T.S. Eliot poem:
" had not thought death had undone so many." (The Wasteland)
They knew before they looked that our own were dying in Iraq.
But they didn't know that they knew. Or more to the point,
They didn't feel what they knew. Somehow the great size of the mock graveyard below
Its physical concreteness, has forced them to feel the pain they didn't want to feel.
Now it is a new person who speaks to me. Some tell me about a loved one or friend
In the service, how they yearn that he or she will come back unharmed.
Some ask to come down to walk among the crosses, or to add flowers or photos.
Some ask if they can help us or contribute money. They give generously.
Some cry. All of those who have gotten this far along speak from the heart:
"Thank you for doing this. Its good of you, its wonderful God bless \'85\
I have had a heart to heart with a stranger, for them an unexpected encounter.
Their politics, or mine, doesn't seem to matter. We are one in our suffering.
"How could they not know and feel?" I ask myself. But then I remember my first time.
My fellow vet Bob Potter asked me to put some of the names on the crosses.
As I am crawling the stations of the crosses, I read the names and ages of those who died.
Most are young, early twenties or late teens. I didn't know, didn't know their ages.
I return to where Bob is writing tags for the names of those who died last week.
"Do you want to put up more?" I say, "Let me catch my breath, it upsets me to read"
But I can't finish the sentence. I cry instead, sobbing with pain, wet with tears.
I had not thought death had undone so many, so young, so many
I have been protesting this war since the days when it was just an idea.
I thought I knew what I knew and felt what I felt.
But I am just another tourist, unfeeling until blindsided by long, long rows of crosses.
Tom Scheff
2004
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As a nation, as a people
we Americans are so woefully inept
at waging peace
at using knowledge and wisdom
to resolve conflicts non-violently
with others whose purposes clash
with our own.
So deeply imbedded in our culture
and our psyches
are the strategies of militarism
the machinery of warfare and
the rusting myths of our patriotism
that we cannot see how we are shackled
by this demonic force that posesses us.
So powerfully bound by our denials
so much the victims of our gullibility
that we cannot see
how the hollow propaganda we are daily fed
by an omnipotent media rules us.
Defending our freedom"
"Preserving our democracy"
are the stilted cliches now cleverly used
to justify the dispatch of our naive youth
to maim and be maimed
to kill and be killed
always on foreign soil
in the cause of pursuing the selfish ends
of callous politicians and corporations.
We are all trapped, in our own peculiar ways,
in this unshakeable nightmare.
How shall we end it?
Charley Dils
2003
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Summer dreams saturated
by too frequent rains
What did this abundance
of rain portend?
Are they alarmists who
contend it's certainly
a symptom of global
warming descending?
Shall I content myself with
faith based explanations
or be reassured by
presidential declamations
of nothing to fear?
But I fret, it seems
they want us to leave
things to chance or
corporate greed expedience
When they're adults
will our grandchildren
hank us for believing
these folks?
Philip Reiss
2004
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a protest awaits the dissenting voice;
a Party passing illusion as choice:
liberty fenced in razor wire
as gathered elites pay to hire
succession to the imperial throne;
object citizen! you are not alone.
Jozef Hand-Boniakowski
2004
BACK TO TOP
Between the Ooh's and Aah's
The night was as black as Charlie's pajama's.
But flairs were being sent up into the Southern Cross
and tracer bullits were crossing the sky
twirling around like a child's sparkler.
It was the 4th of July 1968 in Vietnam
and almost everybody was celebrating
smoking pot, drinking beers or whiskey.
Every so often, there would be a "mad minute"
where everybody flipped her on automatic
and unloaded clips for a minute.
One bunker was going ape with machinegun tracers,
"who the hell is that?" asked one of our guys
to his buddies. "It's Sarge," one answered,
he's all messed up on pot and whiskey."
Another answered in the dark,
"he's been just hooking tracer rounds together
and just shooting trace rounds."
On the LZ that night, the celebrating went on
until everybody called it good except for Sarge
with the machinegun noise and tracer rounds.
Finally, someone said, "Look, a couple of us
better go down there and tell Sarge to quit."
Two walked down there and after a while
Sarge stopped.
A little girl was hugging her daddy's leg
and looking up to the starry black sky.
Then a firework burst like a star
and wiggly red travelled down
like an an umbrella,
then a blue star burst
and a wiggly blue umbrella fell
a white star boomed
with the big thumping boom
like a 500 lb bomb
that shook the air and all the little children
would hide their faces some cried
other's oohed and aahed.
Sarge stood in the crowd and watched
as many parents became little children
and began to "ooh" and "aah"
and point with their fingers
while holding their little ones.
Old Sarge wondered what day
Charlie picked as their Independence
Day. Then he realized
he had been shooting at God
that 4th in Vietnam
under the Southern Cross.
Feelings rose from the heart
of his chest flowing up
into the emotions in his mind
his eye's watering up
and he broke down.
After all these years
the war still bothered him
and he didn't know why.
Dennis Serdel
2004
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Brother Ray has gone away
I'm gonna have to drown in my own tears or
go get stoned for a minute & think about what'd I say.
Maybe hit the road behind my crying times
even though I'm busted.
Like you, I've made up my mind.
I choose to sing the blues to unchain my heart
because I wasn't born to lose either.
You don't know me but
in the heat of many nights you set me free.
So, we'll be together again.
Maybe in some Georgia making a Swanee River rock.
Sippin' at least one mint julep;
talking about the women we got &
how no one's gonna love them the way we love them.
Come rain or come shine.
And the good times will roll!
Horace Coleman
2004
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WINDY TOMBS
Viet Nam has a unique practice for the dead. It is called Ma Gio in Vietnamese, which means Windy Tomb. Windy Tombs are empty tombs constructed in the family or village cemeteries for people who have died or disappeared and whose bodies have never been found. The Vietnamese teach that if the proper funeral rites are not practiced for the dead, their souls wander restlessly and cannot reincarnate. Wandering souls are called Co Hon. The countryfolk report hearing them cry and sing laments in remote areas. They appear in dreams. The MIA problem is especially terrible in Viet Nam because without burials there are a quarter million wandering souls.
The 15th day of the seventh month of the lunar year is a national holiday set aside as a day for wandering souls. It is the full moon. It is the time when the moon is full of yin and thus it rains alot. The Vietnamese say the moon is crying. People all over the country put out food for the
wandering souls on this day so that they are not so lost and homeless.
Alive our souls
need a house to be a home.
Dead our souls
need a tomb for deep rest.
Without a house
we are homeless.
Without a tomb
we wander without return.
My uncle was VC.
His son was ARVN.
North and South --
just like your war.
My cousin was buried
when your tank crushed his tunnel.
My uncle's bones sleep
in a mass grave for both sides.
My family searched
with shovels and spoons
but we could not overturn
the earth and the water.
Finally, finally,
we built windy tombs --
tombs without bodies,
tombs without bones.
Finally, finally,
father and son
sleep together,
rest again.
Once every year
when the moon cries its tears
with rice porridge and cookies
we join in sad feast.
Ed Tick
2004
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Farewell Dave, Goodbye Ron
Green mountains
The Peace Park near the
Golden Dome
Singing "Joe Hill"
Dellinger comes home.
Decades the pacifist
Love and kindness
Jailed, assaulted
Forever witness
Peace the only way
Celebrated today.
Farewell
Desert sands
Opulence by the
Hollywood billboard
Singing. "God Bless Amerika"
Reagan comes home.
Decades the actor
Privilege and power
Worshipped, crowned
Forever profit
Might makes right
Gone today.
Good-bye.
Dave is David Dellinger. Passed away on May 25, 2004.
Ron is Ronald Reagan. Passed away on June 5, 2004, same day as David's Memorial Service, Peace Park, Montpelier VT.
David Dellinger. Presente.
Jozef Hand-Boniakowski
2004
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Don't Look, Don't See
Behind your warlike repartee, Mr. Bush
You don't look, and you don't see Mr. Bush
For as you plot there with your claque
Battle actions in Iraq
Mean one more amputee, Mr. Bush
Stop to see what war has brought, Mr. Bush
800 are now dead- - for naught, Mr. Bush
They're not just numbers' they have names
Jeff, and Michael, Rachel, James -*
Do you give them any thought, Mr.Bush ?
And the dead are all so young, Mr. Bush
Those lives gone for reasons wrong, Mr. Bush
Boys and girls still in their teens
Victims of your war's routines..
Their songs of life will stay unsung .. Mr. Bush
While rockets fire, and copters crash, Mr. Bush
You fly to luncheons, raising cash, Mr. Bush
And every day another dies..
Yet you fault those who criticize.
How can you dare to be so brash, Mr. Bush ?
Soldiers shot at, blown up, burned. .Mr. Bush
Wearing uniforms THEY have earned, Mr. Bush
And just in case you're keeping score
No one ever wins in war.
A lesson you have spurned, Mr. Bush
Keep the wounded out of sight, Mr. Bush
Fly the caskets back at night, Mr. Bush
How many more will come home maimed ?
Why in this hell aren't you ashamed
Of the waste and horror in their plight, Mr. Bush ?
-------
One last thought before you sleep, Mr. Bush
For as you sow, so shall you reap, Mr. Bush
(*Actual names:Jeffrey Braun, dead at 19. Michael Mihalakis, dead at 18. Rachel Bosveld, dead at 19. James Lambert, dead at 22.)
2004
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Memorial Day 2004
To Iraq more Bush Brigades,
Is there a man dismayed?
No! - But all our soldiers know,
Rumsfeld has blundered.
Theirs is not to make reply.
Theirs is not to reason why.
Theirs is just to stay and die.
For re-elections upcoming.
Jared Tinklenberg
2004
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A Nation Rocked to Sleep
Have you ever heard the sound of a mother screaming for her son?
The torrential rains of a mother's weeping will never be done
The call him a hero, you should be glad that he's one, but
Have you ever heard the sound of a mother screaming for her son?
Have you ever heard the sound of a father holding back his cries?
He must be brave because his boy died fro another man's lies
The only grief he allows himself are long, deep sighs
Have you ever heard the sound of a father holding back his cries?
Have you ever heard the sound of taps played at your brother's grave?
They say that he died so that the flag will continue to wave
But I believe he died because they had oil to save
Have you ever heard the sound of taps played at your brother's grave?
Have you ever heard the sound of a nation being rocked to sleep?
The leaders want to keep you numb so the pain won't be so deep
But if the people let them continue another mother will weep
Have you ever heard the sound of a nation being rocked to sleep?
Carly Sheehan
2004
In memory Casey Austin Sheehan, May 29, 1979 - April 4, 2004
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My father loved the sun
The one rising in the sky
And the apple of his eye.
He loved the warmth
Facing into the light
The conversations into the night
Basking in its rays in
Palestine, Trans Jordan days
In the III Corps, Tobruk.
So long ago he said, "Look,
Peace will come when
Palestinians have their homeland
Only then will there be
A chance for humanity."
Gone almost twenty years
The words echo in my ears
As I face west into the sun
That chance slipping away
As fascists pin-striped play.
And they they said "It couldn't
happen here.
My father knew better.
Beware!
Jozef Hand-Boniakowski
2004
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flew a hearse in Vietnam
swing low sweet chariot
coming for to carry them home
except ours stank
all sloshy in their
body bags
no flags
or squared corners
the middlemen
to the morgues
phan thiet and can tho and ban me thuot
and and pleiku and lots of little forts
to saigon and cam ranh bay
and fallujah and najaf and
and tikrit and mosul to
baghdad and basra to quatar
morgues
now the first lady says
"time heals all things"
on her patch of prai*rie grass
in Texas with
her circle of life
attitude.
time didn't heal me
to be smoothed out
and unruffled.
is anybody pissed?
jim willingham
2004
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To My Dear Sister in Fallujah
My Dear Sister in Fallujah, as you hold your baby to your breast,
I pray that tonight your life will be blessed.
You have no water and no electricity
For bombs have carpeted your once beautiful city.
How does it feel to lie in your dark bed
And listen to the bombers that fly overhead?
Your anguish for your baby must be too much to bear
I just want you to know that some American Mothers care
We protest and shout that there should be NO WAR
But our voices can't be heard over the Pentagon's roar.
Babies aren't enemies, so why must they die?
A thousand million times I've asked myself, "Why".
My cheeks are stained with red hot tears
But the bombs keep falling in spite of my fears.
So my Dear Sister, tonight, I'm overwhelmed with shame,
Because my country is playing this evil war game.
Rosemarie Jackowski
2004
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Killin' Time
Gather your daughters and sons
Round up all your guns.
Head down to the WalMart,
The fighting's about to start.
It's Killin' Time again.
Carpet Bombs
Chemical alarms
AK47's, M-16's, bullets, bombs and grenades,
lights in the sky, little boy about to die.
Tune into CNN
the show's about to begin.
It's Killin' Time again.
It's Killin' Time again.
politician's lying,
sons and daughters are dying,
bullet to the back of the head,
another dream is dead.
It's Killin' Time again.
Who's keeping score?
Who's winning the war?
Is it NBC or CNN?
Is it the politician who's lying?
Is it the soldier who lays dying?
Is it the mother who sheds a tear,
the desert child who cowers in fear?
In the end does it even matter who wins?
We'e all just Killin' Time.
Mike Bidwell
2003
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