WAR WATCH WEDNESDAYS #11

 

#11  WAR WATCH WEDNESDAYS, 3-3-21

ANTI-WAR POETRY

Second Name of Earth Is Peace, edited by Mbizo Chirasha and David Swanson.  Charlottesville, Va., World Beyond War, 2020.  A photograph of each author accompanies most of the poem(s).

From the Introduction by David Swanson

“We’re trying to overcome a culture of war, a culture that tells people. . .that war is normal.  We need a culture of peace, artistic creations that allow us to experience not only living without war, but also what it feels like to be traumatized by danger, damaged by witnessing suffering, permanently altered by killing or by the hatred of those trying to kill.”  The poets in this book have “an understanding that war is not an institution to tolerate or respect or refine or glorify, but a sickness to despise and abolish” and “replace with compassion, with fellow felling, with courageous sharing, with a community of peacemakers that is global….”

 

From the Foreword by Mbizo Chirasha

“. . . .This global voices collection yearns to expose to utter nudity the evil…of ruthless political demigods and cruel-hearted warlords as they incessantly plant wars through their greedy, dictatorial and insatiable quest bloodletting, devilish super-power posturing and unrepentant crude-habit of grabbing natural wealth of both militarily weak and politically fragile countries. . . .In defiance, we chant resistance, we fist up resilience, we speak peace.”

 

Samples:

“Hitler and the Wayward Shrink” by Cassandra Swan, UK.  About the psychopaths and sociopaths who seek and gain power, accompanying her campaign to make all political leaders “undergo psychological profiling before they stand for office.”  “The killing machines are born/with the absence of conscience.” 

“Empty Boots and Baby Shoes” by Stacy Bannerman, USA, author of Homefront 911.
“To stand at the lip of the mouth of a grave that will never get enough/catching mothers tears, a nation driven by the dead, is exhausting to my/soul.”

“Honourable” by Jabulani Mzinyathi, Zimbabwe.  “Tell me honorable where is your honor/when the baton does its dance of death on my soul/And when all you do is destroy flora and fauna/Do I detect some irony here honourable sir, madam”

“In Honor of Press Freedom Day 2020” by Omwa Ombara, Kenya.  “I am the armchair journalist/Mocking journalists in jail, those murdered for speaking the truth to power and asylees/Holding my large nose high in contempt….”