Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Poem.... A Poet Tries to Write 9/11

A POET TRIES TO WRITE 9/11
© Barbara Kaufmann, September 2001














I think I know
how the spider feels
when she spins a web
from the juice
of her own body.

Today, Nine Eleven,
there is no juice
only weary hollow bones,
thirsty tissues, a heart
that’s cracked and dry,
the only moisture
a mind that weeps.

When the heart of humanity splinters,
silence screams a land,
and a triage hunts for hope
anywhere alive,
the tightest dressing
is not enough
to stem the bleeding.

When a numbing mind
must caress the carnage
but dares not wander
too far into the gaping despair
for the fear of no return,
it searches for meaning,
gropes to understand
or even just find words...
people looks to poets.

There are some days
the flailing, the wailing
has no voice
nor can the poem.
Some days
the paper stares dumbstruck
and words won’t spill
or peaceably assemble.

In order to write it
the poet must inhale
allow her body
to span the essence
like Egytpian mother Nut,
absorb it to her core
hold it long and deep
like her breath.

Only then exhale the strands
weave them onto paper,
give dimension,
form the matrix,
birth its life and being.
For that she needs moisture.

Go in search of a spider,
watch her spin.
Listen for the wailing in the web,
see her body shudder,
know the sacrifice she makes
to spin such gossamer thread
attach it to the invisible
and hang by it suspended.
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A few Thoughts...

When I think about it, my own life is no less rich and the living no less inspiring than my pioneering ancestors and I come from a long line of Indians and outlaws so don't ever turn your back on me!

Life is, after all, a slice of human consciousness lived from its place in human evolution. "From here to eternity" as it were-- from earth to the stars, from personal space to cyberspace, from a small local footprint to the world reduced to the size of a notebook and sitting on your lap!

As a child I lived with the perpetual and immenent threat of annihilation. That's child abuse! It wasn't a kid-friendly world and I couldn't understand why the grown-ups who were in charge weren't doing something?

So at age seven with my face in the window eyes turned up into the night sky and staring at the stars I made a vow: "When I am a grown-up, I will do something."

My writing is that something and I write to "simply change the world." If that sounds like a lack of humility it isn't because I know that one person absolutely can change the world and I've met some who have.

Kay Kennedy put together an anthology that puts the reader in the midst of history to view it from the inside out.

When I was in high school and even college, history classes were stale and boring featuring memorization and regurgitation of dates that coincided with events that had no human face, certainly no magic, and no life!

Anthologies are great fun and stores are rich remembrances. History books chronicle; stories are little narrative slices of living. History comes alive through story. I often think of my grandmother and her story, her life-- the history she lived. In her lifetime she saw humankind evolve from horse and buggy to man on the moon.

BARBARA'S WORK IN "LOOKING BACK"
I was a sixties kid and for the youth of the sixties, turmoil, disillusionment, and revolution were everyday 'business as usual'. Like a radio perpetually on low volume, fear and death dronned on in the background. The superpowers threatened to extinguish all life on the planet, the Vietnam War was escalating and peers were being escorted home under American Flag blankets. The civil rights and equal rights movements were testing human civility, and faster than one could recover from one shock another real life hero would fall to yet another assassin. Despair was commonplace. Contrast that with a man on the moon... we could conquer space travel but couldn't make nukes or war obsolete! It was a time when youth needed hope because hope was scarce. When it was finally resurrected, it came in the form of idealism and a philosophy of brotherly and universal love. Perfect principles; imperfect execution.

For others who contributed to "Looking Back," the history is different for each because the "times" were different as well as the perspective of the individuals. The stories of human societal evolution are enlightening, heartwarming, poignant and spellbinding. They put a human face on the past.

And there are people now who are putting a face on the future...