STC - Inhumanity

[tungtied2u]

Re: Re: STC-Inhumanity submission

No, regular submission should be fine. I posted here as a precaution, because I'm leaving in a few hours and I won't be around tomorrow (or in the next week).

I figured that was the case, just wanted to be sure.

Oh....and have a grand holiday.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Thank you.

 

[The Mutt]

Re: Re: STC-Inhumanity submission

No, regular submission should be fine. I posted here as a precaution, because I'm leaving in a few hours and I won't be around tomorrow (or in the next week).

Does this mean those of us who have not had their hypersonnets reviewed yet will have to remain on tenterhooks for another week?
Not that that sounds so bad....

 

[The Mutt]

PS Your new avatar blows me away!

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Re: Re: Re: STC-Inhumanity submission

Does this mean those of us who have not had their hypersonnets reviewed yet will have to remain on tenterhooks for another week?
Not that that sounds so bad....

I'm really sorry, but yes. Don't worry, though. I may take a long time, but I always come through.

 

[Zanzibar]

Inhumanity

Inhumanity

Blue
It was his favorite color
Open skies
Oceans
His mother’s eyes
Faded jeans
Sapphire ring
He wore it always, in one form or another

Road Trip
It was his dream to see new places
Cross country
Explore
His earliest desire
West coast
California girls
Dip his foot in the pacific

Wrong Turn
It was his mistake to misread the directions
Downtown exit
Misdirection
His mid-west naivety
South central
Blood territory
Stopping at a corner store for directions

Blue
He wore it always, in one form or another
Wrong place
Confrontation
His final moments
Gang violence
Knives slashing
His life’s essence spreading in a pool around him

Red

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My submission, also posted here for those that don't check the poems (a small number I am sure)

 

[The Mutt]

Re: Re: Re: Re: STC-Inhumanity submission

I'm really sorry, but yes. Don't worry, though. I may take a long time, but I always come through.

That's okay, I'm starting to get the feeling back in my jaw again.

 

[Angeline]

Inhumanity: Kosovo, 1999


       Therefore God becomes as we are, that we may be as he is.
             -- William Blake, 1757-1827


No, Mr. Blake
this one isn't like yours
a Mental War
an overture
for the cosmic acrobatics
that at last cross the fire
of your fantasies

The heroic
once seducer
is now pure test
the battlefield
seen from afar
       from above
       from an island in the moon
is now pure geometry
in the rectangle
of a radar screen

What do you want from us, Doctor Clash?
What do you tell us from afar
       from above
       from your island in the moon?

       Great A, little A,
       Bouncing B!
       Play away, play away,
       You're out of the key!
       Fa me la sol, La me fa sol!

       Musicians should have
       A pair of very good ears,
       And long fingers and thumbs,
       And not like clumsy bears.
       Fa me la sol, La me fa sol!

The new weapons
crossing the skies
dropping on earth
distractedly
missing their targets
while bodies disincarnate bit by bit
in the shadow of shattered bridges

And the skies
springs of water, of fire
continue to dispense
the sustenance of death.

Excellente querida. Can you say Poets Against the War?



 

 

[The Mutt]

Poets Against the War?
Is that a real org?
Where do I sign up?

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Poets Against the War?
Is that a real org?
Where do I sign up?

http://poetsagainstthewar.org

Several of us have poems there, including Angeline, JUDO and smithpeter. I think I have three.

Angeline's was chosen as poem of the day, once.

 

[Belegon]

Danielle


The image of her mother
But incapable of the same denial
You watched her
From your bathroom window

Forsaking things you could not have
You focused on innocence
Rejected by the adult
You turned on a child

Her childhood and her life
You destroyed for lustful anger
Mother’s rejection you revenged
With unimaginable evil

After the atrocity
You bargained for her body
While searchers combed hills
You sought a devils deal

Blond haired and blue eyed
The lost child haunts us
Crushed hopes assaulted
Shattered under a tree in Dehesa

The parent’s fears realized
Communities spirits fallen
While you sat in court
And said the lie “not guilty”

Only you will know how long
She cried and suffered
While you drove the back roads
From sea to desert sands

Were you convinced
Before her end
Did her feeble struggles
Reach what you call a soul?

Dedicated to the memory of Danielle Van Dam

 

[The Mutt]

http://poetsagainstthewar.org

Several of us have poems there, including Angeline, JUDO and smithpeter. I think I have three.

Angeline's was chosen as poem of the day, once.

Thank you, Miss Hynde.
I look forward to contributing there soon.

 

[BooMerengue]

my pen fell upon the page and in anguish wrote some words. not the ones I hoped to, but words just the same. They're submitted for tomorrows postings.

Never again will I attempt such a thing unless I am instantly inspired and it flows out of me.

But I'm glad I did it this time.

Thanks, Champ. For real.

 

[echoes_s]

just going to post this here

inhumanity

inhumanity everywhere,
one person
masses,
cultivating permeated repulse
at other’s situations

finding blame
in something,
someone,
not looking just once
inside ourselves instead.

indifference
racism, prejudice…
cast of glance off shoulders
as footsteps hurry away
stolid stones falling

echoing fuck this
or you,
playing games
abuse
self-centered casualness

we instigate, invigorate
remotely some way,
Condone, support,
overlook or
just silent stay

all feeding a portion
of doubt,
wondering
if there was something ,
once we might change,

one way,
one thought,
one person
who finally speaks,
one action

in passing
something through
others...
have we not all contributed
to inhumanity some way?

 

[tungtied2u]

Inhumanity- Raggedy Ann

I didn't tag this on the new poems post, so I hope those who passed over it there, will give it a look now. Thanks

Raggedy Ann

Pure and pristine
fresh off the shelf,
purchased with promises
of better homes and lives
in the land of plenty.

Sanctuary shapeshifts into cells,
dark and dreary.
Poppets pulled
from the closet’s corner,
become rag dolls
wedged in pit bulls’ mouths,

who shake, paw
probe and gnaw them
until gutted,
stuffing spilling out.

Ripped to shreds,
unrecognizable
in face and form,
they are cast out
into life’s landfill.

That place of sunken eyes
is haunted, without hope,
drained of life.

It is a land
no one visits willingly,
with its shattered shells,
transparent, floating ghostlike
through the landscape.

It is a land
sapped of spirit, where no joy
lives, just rocks, innocence lost,
buried in the rubble of souls
sucked dry of dignity,
bare of desire, trapped
in this world where only screams
ricochet in heads, endlessly echoing
in the emptiness.

Who led them here?

Some serve as guides,
others open doors,
easing the path for those
pushed and flogged
when enticements fail.

Some merely turn their eyes
away, avoiding, yet aware,
afraid they may be next,
complicit in their denial

But none can escape
purity’s perversion
It creeps, spreads
from victim to jailer
cancerous, ravaging
conscience to its core

 

[DeepAsleep]

So, I had this problem, writing my poem for this challenge.

The Genovese story's bugged me since I first heard about it in a Philosophy class I took in college. "Contemporary Moral Problems" or "Intro to Ethics." I very badly did not want to believe this story was true. I asked the prof a bunch of questions he couldn't answer about "What the fuck were they thinking?" and so forth and.. it just sticks and keeps infuriating me more and more.

Anyway, my problem... I got so mad, I couldn't write. I hacked at this poem for days and couldn't seem to get it, because i'd think about her, in that alley, with almost forty people just.. peeking out their windows with their thumbs in the orifice usually used in this particular analogy.. and all I wanted to do was push every one of them through the glass and into the street. I never wanted so many people's faces under my knuckles in my life and I've been mad at a lot of asshats in my short time bumming around on the ol' spinny thingy we call home. (If you note a flip attitude, please forgive. It's my way of not ranting like a moron.)

Feh. This was hard and I hate you for posing it, but I think I'd do it again, because the idea of her that I have in my head is worth a thousand poems that'll never be enough.

...I'm gonna go, now.

~D.A.

 

[Angeline]

So, I had this problem, writing my poem for this challenge.

The Genovese story's bugged me since I first heard about it in a Philosophy class I took in college. "Contemporary Moral Problems" or "Intro to Ethics." I very badly did not want to believe this story was true. I asked the prof a bunch of questions he couldn't answer about "What the fuck were they thinking?" and so forth and.. it just sticks and keeps infuriating me more and more.

Anyway, my problem... I got so mad, I couldn't write. I hacked at this poem for days and couldn't seem to get it, because i'd think about her, in that alley, with almost forty people just.. peeking out their windows with their thumbs in the orifice usually used in this particular analogy.. and all I wanted to do was push every one of them through the glass and into the street. I never wanted so many people's faces under my knuckles in my life and I've been mad at a lot of asshats in my short time bumming around on the ol' spinny thingy we call home. (If you note a flip attitude, please forgive. It's my way of not ranting like a moron.)

Feh. This was hard and I hate you for posing it, but I think I'd do it again, because the idea of her that I have in my head is worth a thousand poems that'll never be enough.

...I'm gonna go, now.

~D.A.

The greatest inhumanity is turning away when one can recognize his or her own humanity by showing compassion, speaking up, protesting. Kitty Genovese is a single example (very similar to what happened to my sister, who died when I was 17--lots of people heard, no one called the police because they didn't want to get involved). The destruction of Jews and many others in death camps went on for years because people were afraid to act or simply turned away. Bessie Smith, the queen of the blues, supposedly bled to death from an arm injury because there wasn't a hospital for "coloreds" close enough...but there was a hospital for "whites" nearby.

This quote has always summed it up for me:

First they came for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn’t speak up,
because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me,
and by that time there was no one
left to speak up for me.

Rev. Martin Niemoller, 1945

Ignorance is death, not bliss. Don't stop till you finish the poem, dear man.


Ange

P.S. I can't get into the new poems page--the "stories" section of lit seems to be down at the moment--so I'll answer your question here. My poem was specifically about the Holocaust and the Lodz Ghetto--my grandfather's family was from Lodz. I purposely kept the poem general enough though so readers could extrapolate to whatever they saw in it. Thanks for your comment.

 

[BooMerengue]

Mornin everyone

I was gonna have a little chat w/ Champ this am about how maybe this STC was a bit much and I know it's my fault and all. And for me it was a bit much. There are so many instances of Man's Inhumanity that I found it harder and harder to choose just one, and got more and more bummed out. And then to take such a huge thing and fit all it implies and all it makes you feel and put it into a small poem seemed a momumental task.

But I just got back from the New Poems and I am blown away! How clever we all are! And how compassionate! Such a diverse grouping of topics!

Before I read any further I want to thank everyone who submitted. I'm having trouble getting the pages opened to read them all, but what I have read is amazing!

I think it would be nice if everyone who submitted gave some comments on other submissions. Some or all- it doesn't matter. We all put a lot of effort into this one. Lets share...

Also it looked like some new names. Thats a very good thing. New blood. New styles. New opinions. I see some really cool things happenin here...

"Groovy!!" she said as she walked away laughing!

 

[echoes_s]

hey Boo

i can't even get the New Poems to open, been trying for the last two days. Had trouble last night even getting here for some reason.

 

[BlueskyBeauty]

good morning!

i can get to the new poems, but it's not letting me post comments. so i'll post comments later when the wrinkles are smoothed out.

what i have read so far has been incredible. very sobering day in the new poems page.

it was wonderful to see all those who participated..or tried to!

 

[Belegon]

It is a little less than an hour since the last post and I can not get in through "New Poems" but I was able to go around through my own member page...the poems are there, we just have to wait for Manu or tech support to fix the issue.

BTW, should I have titled my submission "Inhumanity: Danielle" instead of just "Danielle"? First time I have participated in one of these

 

[champagne1982]

Think about the burning hurt,
searing our words-made-flesh
and leaving them to simmer
in this stewing vat,
called life.

Give a little piece
of your soul onto the fire
and watch as it sputters
shrivelling and charring
to black.

Cry out for the lost
and pray that you
will never suffer
at the hands of the
inhumane.

Death would be better
than a life
tortured.


I cannot express how you have all moved me. Thank you for showing me your faces. They are beautiful, especially when seen in stark contrast to the inhumanities you each chose to rail against.

From slavery to the holocaust and across seas and continents to the here and now, the poets on this forum have shown their diversity and incredible talent in answer to this challenge.

There are no losers. You have all won purely through answering the call to write.

That's what it was all about.

I will link the Inhumanity poems here whenever the list opens.

Once again, I thank you all for participating.

 

[BooMerengue]

I haven't been able to access Angelines entry yet, but I had this started, and then my grand daughter asked me what it meant, and I couldn't go on with it. But it's still with me...

I am a camera
poised over a railway station
a soot gray platform
dark steel trains
spewing gray fumes into the
darkened evening
lines of people
haggard and worn
and starved
frightened
being directed by robots
in impeccable charcoal
uniforms
"Go this way!"
"Go that way!"
Schnell!"
and the lines split like
slag pouring off a heap
shuffling
when suddenly in the dark
one tiny head turned
looked right at me
lovely wondering
trusting blue eyes
surrounded by a halo of golden curls
her tiny hand wrapped in her babushka's
going to the showers...

 

[BooMerengue]

So, I had this problem, writing my poem for this challenge.

The Genovese story's bugged me since I first heard about it in a Philosophy class I took in college. "Contemporary Moral Problems" or "Intro to Ethics." I very badly did not want to believe this story was true. I asked the prof a bunch of questions he couldn't answer about "What the fuck were they thinking?" and so forth and.. it just sticks and keeps infuriating me more and more.

Anyway, my problem... I got so mad, I couldn't write. I hacked at this poem for days and couldn't seem to get it, because i'd think about her, in that alley, with almost forty people just.. peeking out their windows with their thumbs in the orifice usually used in this particular analogy.. and all I wanted to do was push every one of them through the glass and into the street. I never wanted so many people's faces under my knuckles in my life and I've been mad at a lot of asshats in my short time bumming around on the ol' spinny thingy we call home. (If you note a flip attitude, please forgive. It's my way of not ranting like a moron.)

Feh. This was hard and I hate you for posing it, but I think I'd do it again, because the idea of her that I have in my head is worth a thousand poems that'll never be enough.

...I'm gonna go, now.

~D.A.

Deep?? I don't know of the Katy Genovese story, I don't think...

Could you just sort of make a list here of the facts in the case? That in itself might become a poem...

Thanks,
Boo

 

[BlueskyBeauty]

you know, i think poetry needs to be written, things like the holocaust seem to be forgotten..or dismissed as nothing but fiction.

my daughter's great-grandmother on her fathers side was in the camps, and she had the blue numbers across her wrist to remind me everytime we chatted just how real the holocaust was.

i heard the stories, i saw the tears..but about a year ago my daughter came home from school very upset because of a young boy who had pretty much told her that the holocaust hadn't really happened.

i was shocked at the ignorance passed on to this child, and bought my daughter some books to show her just how real it was. how people can forget, or ignore such god awful horrors is beyond my comprehension.

since that time, i've sat and watched the older holocaust movie and schindler's list with her as well as countless documentaries on that horrific event. she's a book worm and has read more books on it now then i have, and is very strongly opinionated about it.

we can't single handedly fix the world, but each doing his or her own part to eduacate ignorance, give what we can..do what we can, the impact can then be a powerful thing.

this was a wonderful challenge!