Distracted...

Distracted by the beauty that is poetry for this month, the headlines and events of these days continue, as though there was no poetry.

I still cannot forget. I'm angry. I've been angry since 2003. Looking back now, knowing the truth, I can see I should have been angry long before that.






The Black Prince


And in five days, FIVE DAYS
Your need for vengeance your
Bloodthirst brought forward the vision
No time for sadness
You seek power you have a dream
You met the press your
Banner raised and the following craft
You executed
Executed on
The American Taliban a sign
Of things to come and this
While we dug for the bodies in the shadow
Of the Statue of Liberty
Liberty – just a word to you and yours
Yoo denounce Geneva
And Gonzales called it quaint
The JAG jagged and Powell protesting
In February of 2002 your grand master
Buried Geneva with the bones of things to come and
Liberty wept
Ali Soufan learned of KSM
By asking the right questions
And you had minions inform
that no Court of Crimes
Would gain our support for you had begun
The lawlessness that breeds coverup and
Donned the brown shirts and
Liberty bled into the bay as you washed
Away the evidence of interrogation so
Enhance, enhanced you say
The FBI found the bright line
And the fifteen rummy began at
Gitmo, washing the sins tropical and the
Prisoners wept into the blue waters of
The Caribbean
Your thoughts turned to Baghdad
where they had been since the beginning
you made certain
The regime on its knees and you were the victor
Finding the spoils to be volatile
You played puppeteer while Yoo launched the supremacy
Of the Commander
A preening poppycock
Of victory upset by Abu
Ghraib and denials began
Goldsmith fallen on his sword
A hero denied the heroism of withdrawal
And what could have been the end slipped
Away upon a black steed
Supreme intervention on Hamdi
First Mora and then Levin swordfought
Windmills and 2005 came
Zelikow’s words are scattered to the winds
And Justice wept
You caused press paralysis
And Congress checked out
Amnesty International raised the blood specter
To no avail
Your heart was hardened
The Senate betrayed the world with
The
Military
Commissions
Act
Of
2006
And you applauded
Vociferous in your victory
Young Obama protests loudly but in vain,still
the world buzz could not be silenced and
The Constitution wept and bled
You, the Black Prince, endorsed once more
The torture that will not be named and
The Red
Cross
Calls foul and then the leak
And your place in historic infamy grew wings
And still the Commander defends
Five years have gone by
And the world weeps.
War crimes.


Does the end
Justify the means?


You may say
I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one.
I dream of a land
Where this will never happen again.
Your dream stains our soil and denies
Our birthright
You, sir, are no American.

~quidrock 2009