Lately
I have been editing a book of my father's correspondence and focusing especially on letters Bertrand Russell wrote to him around
the time of the Cuban missile crisis. In that connection I have been looking into Operation Northwoods and Operation Mongoose.
Interested persons may read declassified
documents about each of these operations on the website of the National Security Archive at Georgetown University. Northwoods was a plan, never implemented,
to comitt acts of terror which would then be
blamed on Cuba as a pretext for military action against that country. These crimes were to have been committed on American soil, and by the United States Department
of Defense. An unclassified memorandum
from the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the Secretary of Defense about this can be read here, and a similarly unclassified document about Mongoose can be read here.
At the Kelly Writers House on the Campus of the Univeristy of Pennsylvania
"
... the asymmetry between the concentrated destructive power of elegant and versatile missiles in the air and the archaic
ferocity of swarms of bearded warriors outfitted with Kalashnikovs on the ground remains a morally obscene sight."
- Jürgen Habermas, in Borradori
(ed.), Philosophy in a Time of Terror: Dialogues with Jürgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida.
In virtue of his obviously hard, hard life, this man resting
in a doorway in West Philadelphia knows things most of the rest of us don't. I'd like to know what they are, without, of course,
having to experience the same hardships. Is that even possible?
.
For Norman
Yengeni
Norman!
I remember the old ladies, some from Guguletu, some from Khayalitcha,
some From Soweto, all so proud of
their sons, even proud, sometimes, that they were In
prison. Mama Afrika -- mother of us all -- I see her smiling down on
you As you stand on the hard, dusty ground
of Darfur.
Norman!
I know what you are doing and I am writing this to acknowledge it. Onetime fighter for Umkhonto We Sizwe,
Longtime prisoner of a racist, fascist dungeon, Truth and reconciliation bore you the sweet fruit of
amnesty, From the new government
of your glorious, beautiful land, A land you
and your comrades liberated!
Norman!
You are now Military Attaché for
South Africa to the African Union. And you are doing the work of Nkosi (God). Did you know that in Cape Town I fell in the deepest love of my life with your struggle?
Colonel Norman Yengeni, You
will stop them, you will save them - you will Fight like the tiger that you are and you will do for Darfur something which Will make your country and your
people and all the people of this Poor long-suffering planet lift
their heads, their hearts, and be proud.
Civilization’s
Underside
I see all
the destitute of the Earth Crouching
Beside dumpsters
In cardboard
boxes
At 6th and San Julian
Surrounded
By Marine Guards In full dress
Sabres drawn
We shall not stop Until it is so The Lancet
And
The New England Journal of Medicine
Reduced to confetti kindling
For the little cooking
Fires Dotting the slums
Of the world
Seen on the screens In underground installations
With indifference
Speaking Truth to Empire about Empire’s
Dark Heart
Speaking truth to empire About empire’s dark heart… About torture and mass
death, Does not endear one to it,
And at our Bangkok Embassy I did exactly that, And at a time of
great personal need
(I had no food or water Or a bed to sleep in, In the tropics)
These are
things Empire Knows it does, but Cannot bear to hear Enunciated about it In public, as I did…
To tell that war criminal President’s men Where to go
Was apparently To be abandoned
By one’s country To the wilderness Of the streets of The “host country.”
And
when I told the Consular Officer That I felt as though I didn’t have a country,
She said to
me, “Your country is ‘Thailand, U.S.A.'"
And
in that strange, homeless, Almost lawless, zone around Important buildings
In diplomatic districts The world over, I have many, many kin –
And some
of them get helped Up off the streets by governments And some are doubtless murdered With impunity.
For Carol
Carol, I am nearly beside myself
with joy And you are the reason; bliss such as I have never known before, Sweetness, when we touch our poor long-suffering
planet Melts away into nothingness in your embrace and I am free. How could I not have known that you were, as
you wrote, “Out there somewhere hoping” that I “find my way back” to you? How could I have
been so blind to your true love two decades ago? It matters so much less now because I have come home from the world To you. I was full of stories but without an anchor, Without a star to steer by: you! Your tender arms… The curve of your spine as you lie beside me So far superior to the various diameters of the globe… To
the latitudes and the longitudes of misery and hunger Where I have been residing - you! I lay my head across your chest And am no longer possessed by the electronic oracles of our age, The televisions and radios and all the front pages Displaying human want and war… to you! To you I have come home Always and everywhere, you are my home…
you are my heart… You are my song, You are the victory of love over suffering…
Monday, January 26, 2009
Our Home in University City
God guide my poem. For love, Love of a lady, And
for care, Care for two children, I remain.
Air
France the environs of Sacre Couer
Frankfurt-am-main Darmstadt
And an alternate future
Jesus Christos, fallen humanity’s
advocate, Help me now.
“You’re under arrest,” the former, high-level CIA officer
Jokingly said to me in a
bar more than three years ago. “Well if
I’m under arrest,” I replied, “I want a lawyer.”
“This is war. You don’t get a laywer,” he replied.
The Prince of Darkness, they used to call me in that bar, I
think because my conversation ranged so often to the Horrors of
war and bad governance.
“I’m
not the Devil,” I once said to the self-same man,
Who may by that time have been “called up.”
“We’ll
be the judge of that,” he said.
For αγαπε…(love)
And the Hatians Sighed
Slave revolt --
Control and public order --
Toussant Louverture --
Emancipation
and the human mind and spirit --
Voudon --
Santeria --
None of the French sailors, tasked To put down the slave
revolt (a mere aside, it was thought) On their way to defend The Louisiana Purchase
territories Left the Island of Hispanola alive
Upon
Finding Peace at 14-16 Rue de Romaineville,
September
26, 2004
The television chatters on, Because I
left it on when I left, And the many Arabs and black Africans in my neighborhood Congregate in the cafes discussing
who knows what. Do I, as a white, European-descended Christian Have any right to know what they are talking about?
In Cape Town, it was a good thing that the blacks spoke English, Sometimes a little Africaans, Xhosa, Zulu and
Sutu, While the whites spoke only English and Africaans. It enabled the blacks to speak behind the backs of the
whites, While in their presence. Some women believe in ‘women’s only meetings,’ And I recall
that at Swarthmore I believed right along with them…
It is a different situation now, With no armed
struggle enjoying the support of the majority Being fought against France, But still, as an outsider I am unsure
about whether café discourse Among these groups Is any of my business.
Of course, I want to be
included – I feel as if I have something to contribute, But this may be inconsistent with my role as a journalist, Which is to observe rather than to interact, To chronicle, rather than agitate – Or is it?
Is
the truth not emancipatory? Does informing a readership of injustices not Increase the likelihood that they will
be resolved, Just as my righteous indignation about my land refusing To extend its hospitality to Yusuf Islam, also
known as Cat Stevens,* Has led me to act (And by “act” I mean “ask questions”
and “write.”)? Yes, I can participate in the struggle for justice Without raising even one hand in anger
against any human person, “Armed” only with my “pen” (laptop computer)
…But
I have said this before. Whence this new peace I have?
________________
* I know they said it was just a mistake involving some other person named
