Saturday, April 6, 2013

“That question, though understandable it’s … I mean, quite frankly, it’s ridiculous.”

 
I can't get this powerful little two minute video by Micah Bournes to imbed, so please go over to Vimeo and watch it. 

And while you're at it, stop by Micah Bournes' website for a visit.

Please! Please! Please! Please! 
Please! Please! Please! 
Please!







& then . . . 
  
Hop on over to Minnie Bruce's website 
(That's what she goes by, you know, "like Fannie Lou or Rita Mae.")
 for some powerful poetry, and possibly, a little enlightenment.

Justice, Come Down
- Minnie Bruce Pratt
A huge sound waits, bound in the ice,
in the icicle roots, in the buds of snow
on fir branches, in the falling silence
of snow, glittering in the sun, brilliant
as a swarm of gnats, nothing but hovering
wings at midday. With the sun comes noise.
Tongues of ice break free, fall, shatter,
splinter, speak. If I could write the words.

Simple, like turning a page, to say Write
what happened, but this means a return
to the cold place where I am being punished.
Alone to the stony circle where I am frozen,
the empty space, children, mother, father gone,
lover gone away. There grief still sits
and waits, grim, numb, keeping company with
anger. I can smell my anger like sulfur-
struck matches. I wanted what had happened
to be a wall to burn, a window to smash.
At my fist the pieces would sparkle and fall.
All would be changed. I would not be alone.

Instead I have told my story over and over
at parties, on the edge of meetings, my life
clenched in my fist, my eyes brittle as glass.

Ashamed, people turned their faces away
from the woman ranting, asking: Justice,
stretch out your hand. Come down, glittering,
from where you have hidden yourself away.



from: The Dirt She Ate: New and Selected Poems. Copyright 2003.
 

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