Weep, and then act

Step away from your television

pull a chair up to the internet
type "al jazeera" into Google, type in "The Independent,"
search for "Robert Fisk,"
("What I am seeing each day in Lebanon is an outrage")
pay the portfolio fee,
read everything he can manage
to post from Beirut,
weep.

Are you stunned that an American
president refuses to call for a cease fire --
the very least a sane person
might do?

How is it possible the Unites States
has has not yet arranged to get 25,000
Americans out of Lebanon? Sound familiar?

Read
about the Israeli peace movement.

Remember,
David fought Golliath --
(One boy with a sling shot against The Giant)
and won –
and the world was on his side
and still is.

Understand,
Lebanon isn't a functioning nation --
is more like a buffer zone between warring
cultures, or was,
now it's a catastrophe,
and so is Gaza,
and Israeli babies are sleeping
in bunkers.

Ask why
an American president
rants the absurd demand that Lebanon call off
Hezbollah, like he insisted Arafat call off suicide bombers
in Palestine when the entire world knew
Arafat didn’t have control over them,
oe even over the foyer to his own office.

Blame the victim, blame the victim, blame the victim --
get it?

Why?
Because it justifies Israeli retaliation
always disproportionate,
always collective punishment,
which is a war crime --
usualy a land grab, a set up for occupation,
like what the US is doing to Iraq.

Step back from the corporate rant.

Step back from your television,
the one that says
anything Israel does is "self defense"
and anything the occupied people
do is "terrorism".

Pull a chair up to the internet.
Google "Truthout," subscribe, contribute,
read Dar Jamal --
"Lebonese refugees speak of catastrophic bombing".

Step away from your television
write, phone, email your congress men and women
tell them to stop funding Israel immediately
tell them to begin impeachment proceedings
immediately against George W. Bush and Dick Chaney,
for war crimes, for setting up military tribunals
in violation of the Geneva Conventions,
for treason re. outing CIA agent Valerie Plume --
for rigging the electoral process,
for crimes against humanity.

Stand back from your television.
Write, email, telephone your congress members
tell them to fire Donald Rumsfeld, Condolezza Rice, John Bolton --
for trying to orchestrate WWIII.

Step away from your television
Jump into the blogosphere, search for news
about the Middle East, read for a whole day, another --

Step away from your television.
Find out what’s happening in the world,
and weep.

And then act.




Susan Bright is the author of nineteen books of poetry. She is the editor of Plain View Press which since 1975 has published one-hundred-and-fifty books. Her work as a poet, publisher, activist and educator has taken her all over the United States and abroad. Her most recent book, The Layers of Our Seeing, is a collection of poetry, photographs and essays about peace done in collaboration with photographer Alan Pogue and Middle Eastern journalist, Muna Hamzeh.

HOME

What it is About

Earthfamily Principles

Earthfamilyalpha Content II

Earthfamilyalpha Content

Links

LANGUAGE TRANSLATIONS