human rights
This page has been set up simply to light a virtual candle and keep a light burning for basic human rights. It is not here to provoke arguments, rather to remind us that we are all here on the same planet. Please feel free to send in work for this page. The page is here for expression; not to dictate or provoke. Whatever your politics, wherever you are from, please take a moment to think about moving towards a World free from torture and slaughter.
He'd Look Like Me
Michael James Treacy He'd look like me |
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He'd look as smart as I look in a suit -
if he had a decent shirt
and a nice tie
and a pair of shoes;
perhaps...
a good haircut.
I bet he could cry
like I can cry;
I bet he could love
like I can love;
I bet he could laugh
like I can laugh.
They say he's got a soul,
like I've got a soul;
they say that God made him,
like God made me;
they say he's a human being,
like I'm a human being...
so why did he starve to death then?
Snails
John J Whitmarsh
The animal in all of us
The beast that celebrates
The ability to rape,
The capacity to murder
And to mutilate
In the name of authority
Is the beast we should fight against;
But we seldom feel the need
When greed dictates our actions,
Or when the main attraction
Is power beyond our dreams;
Then, it seems,
We are the lowest of the animals
Beneath the jackal and the
Ravenous vulture,
Beneath the worm
And lower than the snails.
Feast
Braja Sorensen
I sat and watched the core
of suffering humanity
feast upon life, ravishing each moment,
like it were the last
the whore illusion smiled back
the red slash of her mouth irresistible
she gorged, but on the weakness of the willing
are you happy now? she asked
indifferent to their bleating responses
they sat back sated
wanting more
no one is happy here she thought
the relentless stuffing of the body
does not feed the soul
I Was Once A Poet
Cyrus Mahan
I was once a poet,
In a far distant land.
My people were absorb my poems
They were telling me:
It cures depression
It is against oppression.
It is a bullet in the heart of repression.
I was once a poet.
But you know how things are there;
In my land
If you are a poet
They will come for you
If you are not a poet
They will make you a poet
They will beat you until you confess you are a poet.
Over there
Being a poet is dangerous sphere, my dear.
But if you are a poet
Dont say you are a poet
In fact;
You are a poet
But only you know you are a poet.
Or so better be.
They dont know you are a poet
Or so better be
For if they do
Then your head will blow
Or your body will flow
Even when the car is so slow
Or
All of a sudden
You may decide not to come home,
If you are a poet.
In my land
Dreams and deaths
Poet and pain
Are close friends, you know.
I was once a poet
Not here, of course.
In my land
I was a poet
That is what the people told me
I was once a poet
And my poems
Blistering through the cement walls
And landing in far faraway lands
On my peoples hands
My poems
Not knowing the fear.
Yes
It is true
And God make me a stone
If I am not telling you the truth.
I was once a poet
And the prisons walls were shaking from the bullets of my words
I had transformed the vocabularies into bullets
And the jails
Were trembling from their bases
And the guards
The guards were hunting the air for my words.
The cement, the stones, the jails and the guards were all wavering
But that was in my land.
In your land
You dont accept me as a poet.
But I was once a poet.
If you dont believe me
Go and see for yourself
Go and see the latticed walls of the prisons
They are either by my words
Or else
The bullets that shattered the hearts of the other poets
You know how things are there
The firing squad sits and shoots
And the poets go down and the blood, the poetry and the bullets
All go through the wall.
In my land
I was a poet.
There,
If you are a poet
You write your poems on the walls
Or a piece of paper, if you find
It might be a cigarette box
Then you eat them,
The poem and the cigarette box
So that the guard
Cannot put them ablaze.
You know
Things are different over there
You call it rough.
If you write poetry
Here comes the military
You;
with your words
They;
with 72 tools of onslaught
They might put your head
In a plastic bag
And open the gas
Or iron you hot
Like a piece of cloth
Or hang you for days
From the ceiling of fates.
Or if they are kind
Lash you few hundred times
Then you have to walk
With your feet merged into blood,
For if you dont
The trace will tell it all.
Here if you write a good poem
You might get a prize
There
If you write a bad poem
You might be fried.
In a distant land
I was once a poet.
Though with a limited access to the words
I was still a poet
Loads of words are forbidden you know.
A poet cannot write: Red, Black, Sun, Moon, Night, and Light
But
With the language of Morse,
Floating the cells and jails
My poems
Erupted the prison walls and landed on the lands
Where people drank them at a glance.
In my peoples hands,
My poems were passing on and on.
Blistering the cement of cubes and traveling with the speed of sound;
From the solitary confinement,
I would put the guards,
In state of trance
And then reach my people
In a swift glance.
I am coming from a distant terra firma
A land that having a funeral
If you are a poet,
Is opulence.
Funeral granted to those who
Do nothing, see nothing, and hear nothing.
Over there,
Although I did not have access to all the words,
And wasn't thinking of having a funeral
I was still a poet.
But in your land,
I am still writing the same poems,
Believe me it is the same poems even better.
Poems;
That used to smash the cement of jails.
And the padlocks and the police,
Could not even spot them soaring out
But here,
They cannot fracture the thin tone.
You know how things are here.
See! In your land
My poems
Travel at a snail's pace
From once being traveled
With the speed of sound.
From breaking the prison walls
To not breaking the thin air.
Believe me or not
I am still a poet.
Poetry, Blood and Cyanide
Cyrus Mahan
I will fight you
With a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide.
I will fight you to the bitter end
So that my neighbor,
A bus driver of fifty or so,
Can shave his beard and let his mustache grow.
I will fight you
With a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide
So that the bank teller of my neighborhood
Is allowed to wear his tie and perfume
And the school teacher that I have known since I was six
Can dress up in the morning
In a three—piece suit,
I will fight you
With a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide
So that you, the foreigner
Without a fear of apprehension,
Can visit me at my home
And my neighbors daughter
Who has just joyfully completed her first year at school
Need not hide her head
For some more years
I will fight you
With a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide
So that the kids of the south ghettoes
On the last Wednesday of the year
Can merrily jump over the flames
And the same kids
On the thirteenth day of the New Year
May gather in a garden
And the young girls
With no shame
Tie nudes on the graces,
I will fight you
With a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide
I will fight you in the city streets
In the rice fields of the north,
In the seashore of the south,
On the Elburz peak
And the central creek
I will fight you
With a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide
So that the Jews are allowed to be Jews
And Bahais and Christians and Buddhists
Alongside with Zorastrians and whoever else
Can pray to their gods, no permission asked.
I will fight you
With a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide
So that Iran
Will rest in peace and let others respite
And the nations of the world
Come together in accord.
I will fight you with words,
With a book of poetry
Hidden under my cloths
And a necklace of cyanides
Standing by
And my teeth set to chew
I will fight you
With poems, blood, my teeth and cyanide
I will fight you to the bitter end
I will fight you for the rights of prostitutes
That you stone in public show
I will fight you and
These are my reasons:
Perfume, mustache, tie, three—piece suit, joy of jumping over the flames, music of all kinds, having a typewriter, tie the grasses in the thirteenth day of the new year, communists and Jews and Bahais having a decent burial.
I am not talking of the mass graves,
The executions,
The stoning,
The death by hanging,
The torture and torment,
The destruction of a nation.
I am holding you responsible for simple things.
Ties and perfumes and decent burial.
Therefore,
I will fight you.
I will fight you
with a book of poetry
And a necklace of cyanide.
Notes:
The word cyanide used in this poem is the true story of Iranian revolutionaries during the struggle against the Monarchy and then the Islamic regime. We used to have carried a capsule of cyanide so that we can chew of it in the case of danger and save the information from falling in the hands of the reactionaries. So much information saved as a result of applying this practice.
In Iran under the Islamic regime, tie and perfume are not allowed and girls over 7 years of age are forced to cover their heads.
Message from Cyrus:
You probably know that my fellow Iranian poet Saadi, wrote a poem eight century ago that later became a motto on the entrance of the United Nations building.
Saadi, eloquently manifested:
The sons of Adam are limbs of each other, Having been created of one essence.
When the calamity of time affects one limb The other limbs cannot remain at rest.
If thou hast no sympathy for the troubles of others
Thou art unworthy to be called by the name of a human.
The Lie
Alan Corkish
individually we
merely function
individually we
are wounded
and isolated
individually we
have no purpose
exist only
live a lie
united
we breathe
again
find purpose
exist with reason
dismiss the lie
Heads Bent In Silence
Alan Corkish
i will not sit head bent
in silence
while children are fed
sour bread
and dull water
i will not sit head bent
in silence
while people rant
for the justice
of death
i will not sit head bent
in silence
while gossip destroys
the souls of
human beings
i will not sit head bent
in silence
at any stage of my life
and i will depart
this world
with words
spitting from my lips
like bullets
...too many pass this way
heads bent
in silence
Dungeon
Carrol Wetherington
Leave this dungeon unrepent
chains fall loose
disarray
hear mortals cry
unconvinced
to die
today
archive this horror
document
display for all to see
voices in the darkness
songs of time lament
souls given
freedom
to wonder where
they went
Epistemologies on Being Owned By White People
Deidra Suwanee Dees
your grandmothers were owned by white people
my people were not
they did not buy and sell us,
they did not force us to cook for them,
clean toilets, pick cotton,
they did not force us to lay down for them,
but now we do it for free.
Please note..the following poem is not laid out correctly...it will appear correctly soon.
Daily Occurrance
Alan Corkish
hurrying feet flee
uniformed figures that
maul and clutch
at their blameless
nakedness.
remember, that this
is happening every day...
give pause, and ponder,
hear, if you will, the
terrified fear in the
screams of innocents.
Human Being
Mariella Lavender
Paint the sky with diamonds,
Dust the fields with stars,
Stretch your arms above me,
Rid the world of speeding cars.
Look down upon our world,
Give us just one tear,
See the holes in our protection,
Giving way to what we fear.
Now and then the East meets West
An armament race to settle our souls
Petty bickering over who is best
Into the Fire of Violence, you shovel the coals.
Empty rivers and clogged up skies,
Food that we're afraid to eat,
Dried up tears in hollow eyes,
The homeless, unlucky, who live on the street.
Ah, the pillage, the rob and the rape,
Synonymous with the human race,
Cover the victim's mouth with tape,
Lest the poor sod may try to escape.
But now we hold our homeland hostage,
While she nurtures her children still,
Making excuses, building our cage,
We say it's just in our nature to kill.
Purge my spirit of its misfortune,
To be lumped together without seeing,
This race that sings sadly out of tune,
The curse of the name 'human being'.
Heart of the City
M.M Graham
In the heart of the city
there are shadow people
sleeping in doorways
and lost souls bundled-up
in cardboard boxes.
The metropolis has an abundance
of street accommodations
where the fallen,
can stay down and out.
Becoming residents in rags,
never leaving home.
They are the neighbours
who brandish begging cups
to be filled with the bitter wine
of a sour community spirit.
Feeding on left-over scraps
from the kitchens of commerce,
who's fat cats,
never had to hunt for a meal
in the littered back alleyways.
And underneath damp bridges
the home-fires burn.
Sending bright embers into
the empty night, where they
fade and die in the shadows,
reminiscent of the ghosts
who haunt this place.
This is Cardboard City,
and it has no heart.
If it did have one,
it would be concrete cold
and far too hard to ever break.
Souli
Dmitry Drozdovsky
Women of Souli - daughters, wives -
I know your hearts are with me.
Look with clear eyes
on our trees, the pines;
the cliffs of Souli. Clear eyes hold
the vision longest. Look then
at the sky, inhale the air
we share with everything
that breathes and is.
Now tell me: is it better
to die willingly on such a day,
together, dancing to the precipice -
affirming all we are and all we love -
or live a lifetime more,
to die defiled and stripped of liberty?
There are maybe twenty steps,
our heads unbowed, our lives
held lightly, hand in hand
my sisters, to the edge.
Souli: a place in the mountains of Epirus (Greece) synonymous with freedom since the time of the Ottoman occupation of Greece, when the people of Souli demonstrated their passionate commitment to liberty.
Human Being
Paint the sky with diamonds,
Dust the fields with stars,
Stretch your arms above me,
Rid the world of speeding cars.
Look down upon our world,
Give us just one tear,
See the holes in our protection,
Giving way to what we fear.
Now and then the East meets West
An armament race to settle our souls
Petty bickering over who is best
Into the Fire of Violence, you shovel the coals.
Empty rivers and clogged up skies,
Food that we're afraid to eat,
Dried up tears in hollow eyes,
The homeless, unlucky, who live on the street.
Ah, the pillage, the rob and the rape,
Synonymous with the human race,
Cover the victim's mouth with tape,
Lest the poor sod may try to escape.
But now we hold our homeland hostage,
While she nurtures her children still,
Making excuses, building our cage,
We say it's just in our nature to kill.
Purge my spirit of its misfortune,
To be lumped together without seeing,
This race that sings sadly out of tune,
The curse of the name 'human being'.
Mariella Lavender
THERE ARE NO CHILDREN HERE
They were blown away in holocaust ashes.
Small bits, the size of petals or puppy paws were found
on hillsides, in hedgerows, or sprinkled in summer gardens.
Here? There are no children.
They were taken by the fairies wanting something sweet.
The little ones just bite sized melted on the tongue. Everyone was hungry then.
The youngest, taken first, toddled toward the open arms, the gaping maw of famine.
There? No children are here.
They were murdered: burned, shot, killed in cities, towns, east, west, north and south.
They flamed briefly, candles on a cake.
Fireworks became firebombs
in a place where there are no birthdays.
Here? No children are there.
Now there are tears where there were children.
Mothers rend their hands, keen and call for them.
But there is no sound.
There is only silence.
There are no children here.
Penelope Thoms
Feast
I sat and watched the core
of suffering humanity
feast upon life, ravishing each moment,
like it were the last
the whore illusion smiled back
the red slash of her mouth irresistible
she gorged, but on the weakness of the willing
are you happy now? she asked
indifferent to their bleating responses
they sat back sated
wanting more
no one is happy here she thought
the relentless stuffing of the body
does not feed the soul
Braja Sorensen
Liberation
You have liberated me
From the shackles of my heritage
From the unreasoning bonds
Of the faith of our forefathers
And no harm will ensue
From this enlightened view
Wherein love and peace
Outgrow the narrow space
Of fear and retribution
That dominated our moral upbringing
How can we help the world to see
That mutual support
Which is so intrinsic
To most communities
And most societies
Offers the only paradigm
For individual salvation
As well as fostering peaceful coexistence
By the elimination of mindless self-seeking
Conducted ferociously
At the expense of innocent victims
If only we could devise an action plan
To sell to this fractured world
(In which even a Road Map for peace
Is doomed to lose its way)
That might weaken the power of hatred
Engendered by uncompromising doctrine
Saturated with fear of personal deficit