Seventy teen-agers
Rumbled last night
On Windward Avenue
Just two blocks away.
Helicopters buzz—
Cops abound—
No one hurt—one arrest.
Near isolated Gaza,
A flotilla loaded with
“Humanitarian aid”
And belligerent attitude
Is intercepted by warships
Loaded with self-righteousness.
Nine dead,
Ambassadors recalled.
Buffed bodies
Vie for prizes
Down at Venice Beach
As a four engine
Warplane flies over at one hundred feet
To celebrate dead warriors
With huge noise.
Fetid oil and gas
Gush from a wound
One mile deep
While addled wise men
Propose solutions
On blackboards.
It’s Memorial Day
And the barbecues
Are hot and ready—
Beer barrels tapped,
And loud noise throughout the night
Assured.
Last week, Sunni gunmen
Entered two mosques
Where Muslims,
Whose dogma differed,
Lay prostrate in Friday prayer.
More than one hundred wounded,
Eighty killed,
To celebrate
Allah (the Merciful, the Beneficent).
So much to say—
Why am I choked?
(6/1/10)