Saturday, December 24, 2011

INTIMATIONS OF THE NEXT WORLD

23.

"We can't go on
living in shame,
breaking the rules
of the game."
Robbie Robertson

This solstice the sun
rises over fields of blood:
Iraq, Syria,

the 60 thousand dead in
Mexico's new Dirty War

against its people:
student protesters gunned down
on a highway in
Guerrero just last week, and
narco gangs have the green light

to massacre folks
going home for Christmas on
Veracruz buses.
The gringos withdraw their troops
from Iraq, leaving a huge

embassy (the size
of El Salvador), thousands
of mercenaries
and a sectarian war
exploding everywhere.

In Cairo: army
exceptionalism and
privilege pitted
against the demands for rights
yields a mounting death toll and

no gentle good night;
sticks and stones against billions
in gringo weapons.
"The U.S. just buys countries",
says my nephew Max, "That's their

foreign policy."
Once paid for, the people are
ducks passing in a
shooting gallery: Target
practice. In Panama, 5

thousand victims of
new U.S. weapons come back
to their barrio,
a piquant patchwork mola
of souls stitched by Kuna hands.