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The Bombing of Baghdad
1 began and did not terminate for 42 days and 42 nights relentless minute after minute more than 110,000 times we bombed Iraq we bombed Baghdad we bombed Basra/we bombed military installations we bombed the National Museum we bombed schools we bombed air raid shelters we bombed water we bombed electricity we bombed hospitals we bombed streets we bombed highways we bombed everything that moved/we bombed everything that did not move we bombed Baghdad a city of 5.5 million human beings we bombed radio towers we bombed telephone poles we bombed mosques we bombed runways we bombed tanks we bombed trucks we bombed cars we bombed bridges we bombed the darkness we bombed the sunlight we bombed them and we bombed them and we cluster bombed the citizens of Iraq and we sulfur bombed the citizens of Iraq and we napalm bombed the citizens of Iraq and we complemented these bombings/these “sorties” with Tomahawk cruise missiles which we shot repeatedly by the thousands upon thousands into Iraq (you understand an Iraqi Scud missile is quote militarily insignificant unquote and we do not mess around with insignificant) so we used cruise missiles repeatedly we fired them into Iraq And I am not pleased I am not very pleased None of this fits into my notion of “things going very well” 2 The bombing of Baghdad did not obliterate the distance or the time between my body and the breath of my beloved 3 This was Custer’s Next-To-Last Stand I hear Crazy Horse singing as he dies I dedicate myself to learn that song I hear that music in the moaning of the Arab world 4 Custer got accustomed to just doing his job Pushing westward into glory Making promises Searching for the savages/their fragile temporary settlements for raising children/dancing down the rain/and praying for the mercy of a herd of buffalo Custer/he pursued these savages He attacked at dawn He murdered the men/murdered the boys He captured the women and converted them (I’m sure) to his religion Oh, how gently did he bid his darling fiancée farewell! How sweet the gaze her eyes bestowed upon her warrior! Loaded with guns and gunpowder he embraced the guts and gore of manifest white destiny He pushed westward to annihilate the savages (“Attack at dawn!”) and seize their territories seize their women seize their natural wealth 5 And I am cheering for the arrows and the braves 6 And all who believed some must die they were already dead And all who believe only they possess human being and therefore human rights they no longer stood among the possibly humane And all who believed that retaliation/revenge/defense derive from God-given prerogatives of white men And all who believed that waging war is anything besides terrorist activity in the first place and in the last And all who believed that F-15s/F-16s/ “Apache” helicopters/ B-52 bombers/smart bombs/dumb bombs/napalm/artillery/ battleships/nuclear warheads amount to anything other than terrorist tools of a terrorist undertaking And all who believed that holocaust means something that only happens to white people And all who believed that Desert Storm signified anything besides the delivery of an American holocaust against the peoples of the Middle East All who believed these things they were already dead They no longer stood among the possibly humane And this is for Crazy Horse singing as he dies because I live inside his grave And this is for the victims of the bombing of Baghdad because the enemy traveled from my house to blast your homeland into pieces of children and pieces of sand And in the aftermath of carnage perpetrated in my name how should I dare to offer you my hand how shall I negotiate the implications of my shame? My heart cannot confront this death without relief My soul will not control this leaking of my grief And this is for Crazy Horse singing as he dies And here is my song of the living who must sing against the dying sing to join the living with the dead from Kissing God Goodbye (1997) and from Directed by Desire. The Collected Poems of June Jordan. Copyright 2005 by the June M. Jordan Literary Estate Trust |