Give Terrorism A Chance

international | anti-war / imperialism | opinion/analysis

Sunday June 29, 2008 10:59

by Mark C - Poetry.ie

mark at poetry dot ie

This is a summary of the so-called 'War on Terror'. It is a poem that I began writing in Bosnia in the summer of 2005 and still go back to to add the odd word, phrase, comma, etc, now and again.

I'm presenting it here (with a small number of notes at the end) to try to encourage more from the artistic community in Ireland in denouncing the war(s), but also because its contents are still relevant (I had hoped that it would have been out of date before I go to finish it).

Give Terrorism A Chance

I’m summarising, but…
Summertime, and…
It’s gonna get hot.

War.
What is it good for?
Controlling oil and ideology?
Let he who has never sinned realise
That as they are throwing stones,
The do not realise:
They live in a glasshouse.

The tree is burning.
The Bushua tree is burning.
Still,
Still it’s burning, like a burning bush.
And still it’s burning, like a burning bush.
And as Rome burned,
But as Rome burned,
Nero fiddled with himself.

Show me your friends.
I’ll tell you who you are.
“Cyclops, hand him over.
Cyclops, hand him over.” [1]
The deal is done.
He will come,
Through the land of the pure. [2]
“Evidence,” says Cyclops.
“We do not condemn without evidence,
No matter how tenuous.
Yes, we like theatre too.” [3]
The deal’s undone.
He will be gone.
To the land of the poor.

“Cyclops, can you see him?
Cyclops, are you with him?
Cyclops, where are you?
Have you Kybher-Passed away?
It’s okay, it’s okay.
We’ve got a fight for Mr Hussein.”
(All in an effort to show who’s sane.)

Size, Control, and Profit Orientation.
Sources of News.
Advertising.
Flak.
Fear and Consumption of Terrorism.
Let’s get this consent manufactured.
Big Busher, your son hastens to do thy pleasure. [4]
Let’s bring this mountain to Mohammad.

The big guns.
Look at his big guns.
He can’t have those big guns;
They’re not in our interests.

Show me my friends.
Tell the world who I am.
I don’t have any friends.
The world knows I’m Saddam.
Have pity on me.
Have pity on me.
What did I do to deserve such a tasteless Manhattan?
What about my people?
Oh, don’t sanctify,
Please don’t sanctify,
What about my people?
Haven’t they been sanctified enough already?

We have pity for you.
Now say: “Awe”.
You’re shocked.
Now say: “Awe”.
Open wide.
Now Say: “Awe”.
That’s better.
Extraction over and just beginning.
We have your,
Sorry, I mean we have given you your freedom.
Such a beautiful gift;
Such a pity to waste it on the free.
We have your … (better not say it).
What’s the time?
It’s April, 2003.
Time to go down in history.

You never found the World’s Mad Dogs.
You never showed me my friends.
You just cried havoc,
And unleashed the dogs of war.
But the world knows who you are.
And the world knows what you are.
And there you stand,
And there you are.

There he is.
A bounty on his head,
And a bounty in his hole.
Get him and his bounty.
(The world loves irony.)

Be careful.
You’re young.
Learn to walk,
Before you run.
You need stabilisers on that,
Or else you’ll fall over.
You need to be stabilised.
We vote to stabilise you.

Awww!
Wonder and awe.
And a shock in store.
The children.
Here come the children.
Here come the children – with bombs.
Al-Qaradawi is throwing children bombs.
But al-Qaradawi is a Qatari.
Perhaps we should go for al-Zawahiri!
We are the warriors against terrorism.

Take a big gulp.
Swallow your pride.
Easy it goes down with sugar.
There is nobody celebrating in the streets now.
All the statues have come down.
What a comedown,
Especially now with the party over.
It’s time to go home.
We are the terrorists against war.
Ayatollah is our ally.
We just need to look west.

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Comments (14 of 14)

Notes

Sun Jun 29, 2008 11:02

Notes
[1] Cyclops here is Mullah Omar, the one-eyed leader of the Taliban.
[2] Pakistan translates into English as 'the land of the pure'. Bin Laden was to be handed over to the American's via Pakistan (with Bin Laden's acceptance of the deal). The plans were later scuppered by the Americans in favour of a war (which would allow greater access to Afghanistan (and eventually get a pipeline built to move Caspian Sea oil reserves to the Gulf). See John Pilger's essay ' The Great Game' in his book The New Rulers of the World.
[3] Some have claimed that the destruction of the World Trade Centre was almost like a work of art - certainly a spectacle - as was the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Taliban. See, for example, David Hawkes's book Ideology.
[4] One of the Hadiths in Islam states from Aisha (Mohammad's wife): 'Verily, thy Lord hastens to do thy pleasures'. Aisha had asked Mohammad why Allah assumed all believers were male. After the question there was a gender balance in Allah's pronouncements, to which Aisha replied with the quote above. More details: Tariq Ali, The Clash of Fundamentalisms.

Nice one Mark.

by paul o toole

Sun Jun 29, 2008 11:54

pauljotoole at eircom dot net

I write poems and poetry amd songs to help me stay sane in this ever devolving inhumane place we call home...
Heres one of my ones...

A brave new world.

But who am I to question....
Is this fate, or is there room for my voice to be heard for the sake of my children at least, in what time is left this world, as we know it.
With every beat of my heart, the very earth on which my feet stand upon....is changing, every laboured breath a waste of time, when I could be doing something.

Those Greedy Capitalist Bastards tear asunder the very fabric this civilised world has come to know-
....ancient in it’s derision, it’s journey ..fraught with ill-temperament...
..yet it has to stand for something.

The clock ticks... ever louder as the hour approaches.. My heart is beating in another part of the world.
Should I pray, or should I scream to a world that doesn’t want to know until blood drips
down our own doorstep.

...As the sun sets on this Island, the beauty is shattered only by my thoughts..of the
insanity to befall us all, and if this be Armageddon’s approach I welcome the
proposition and of god I ask...”why did you not do something”...

So, if love exists outside this physical world, I will raise my voice with who ever else will, and walk with my brothers and sisters, down the road...
..... Towards a brave new world

Thanks Paul

Mon Jun 30, 2008 11:14

Paul,

Thanks for your kind comment.

But more importantly, thanks for also publishing some creative work in response to my piece. It's not always easy to put yourself forward in that manner.

Also, can I say that I thought it was quite an accomplished piece? I especially liked your use of ellipses.

Keep it up!

Mark.

Poietry hmmmmm

by reasons to be cheerful

Mon Jun 30, 2008 18:20

let those who clamor to ridicule do so.
Shoot the message and the messenger together, lest they masticise into something beautiful that you may not have eyes within to envisage or understand.
Submit your ofrfering and hold it up to public scrutiny if you dare, blue violet, is that your sudonynumb

Personally, I encourage all poetry and dont judge it. Poetry , like all creative work and art, is seen by each observer through their own personality. Interestingly, Your commentry speaks more of you than it does of the object of your unconstructive criticism

encouraging bad poetry is possibly why we have so little good poetry.

by blue violet

Mon Jun 30, 2008 18:38

I agree with the message. I don't think it is delivered well. I can't read nor could I listen to this without thinking of how lamely it mimics the good free verse and anti-war poetry of Ginsberg or just want to hear Edwin Starr's "war what is good for?" song instead.

If we want people to write poetry and people want us to read their poetry in the context of "opinion and analysis" then it is only fair to analyse the poem and criticise how well it serves the function of its opinion.

There is not really so fine a line between self-indulgent nonsense and the writing of ones thoughts without the syntactical bounds of sentance structure or the communicative restrictions of a SMS text message as many people like to think. Maybe the writer of this poem thinks it works when spoken, that its sounds transcend immediate semantic meaning or usual associations. I'm not saying he should have written a haiku for the first triad or a sonnet for the fourteen lines. I don't think the poem is a bad poem because it is in free verse or respects no forms or traditions. The Aristotlean definition of poetry which includes mimicry is why I fault this poem.

I would have preferred to have read the excellent original anti-war poetry of Ginsberg instead of these 134 Conroy lines.

I don't think even that work would belong in "opinion and analysis" but I daresay reading it might encourage "more from the artistic community in Ireland in denouncing the war(s), but also because its contents" [to quote Mark Conroy who might have left out the pretentious "more"]. If we are all capable of writing bad poetry, and I doubt we are, many of us having at influenced a small bit by Irish secondary level education to know what good poetry is and so, I'd hope, be educated out of publically airing awful poetry - then I'd suggest we no longer have an "aristic community in Ireland and accordingly we should all publish bad poetry.

Will this stop a war?

It is arguable that good poetry can if not stop a war increase and mobilise opposition to it. That was the case with Ginsberg's free verse and Bob Dylan's rhymes. We should not devalue good poetry by tolerating bad poetry. We should not turn a blind eye to self-agrandisement and promotion of yet another "poetry website".

At Least Someone's Making an Effort

by Fred Johnston

Mon Jun 30, 2008 19:58

I would suggest that 'blue violet' learns to spell before he or she starts out to criticise anyone's poetry. 'Sentence' is not spelt with an 'a'. Yes, it is often said that propagandising makes for bad poetry; but bad poetry is better than silence and infinitely more honest than band-waggoning. I applaud anyone who, in this conservative, mé-fhein atmosphere, writes something in protest against the brutalities being committed world-wide. So good on you, lads. You will always have the side-swipers. Every time they utter a statement it's as if a vacuum crept into the room. Keep rhyming, keep speaking out, keep talking.

Mark, heres a tune, and well done again

Tue Jul 01, 2008 11:24

Sang this in Galway and almost got attacked by a bush-lover, next time in Dublin it was voted to be the new Anthem amongst the slightly tipsy lot....I appreciated the sentiment though....

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Give Terrorism A Chance

Comments (14 of 14)