War's
First Week
The
cakewalk
has
become a bit sticky
some
Iraqis have turned
their
daisies
into
rifles
&
hand grenades
seems
many
don't
like tyrant Saddam
nor
foreign invaders
dropping
cruise missiles
and
cluster bombs
In
Basra the water supply
has
been cut off
and
we are seeing
the
possibility
of
humanitarian catastrophe
war
should never
have
been viewed
as
a latenight poker game
initiated
by those
too
zealous
to
send their own kids
into
urban combat
It'll
take millions of patriots
&
internationalists
(truthfully
the same folks)
to
throw the lunatics
out
the White House
Until
then we are facing
more
weekends from hell
as
well more spring days
filled
with thousands
marching
down Broadway
for
a democratic peace
This
is one of the two
oldest
stories on the planet
(both
originating here)
Let
the battle for ideas
replace
those young corpses
growing
cold under desert moons
3/24/03
To
the Northern Winds July 4, 2002
Sitting
in cabin kitchen with Vivian
meditating
with eyes open
following
breath out nostrils
the
day clear and beautiful
but
cold, and windy as hell
it's
heaven up here in Canada's north country
no
inkling of industrial air pollution
not
another human being within 50 miles
just
Vivian and I reenergizing our love
and
daily nightly mercurial wanderings
forest
dust blows from here through the hemisphere
it
slips through the eyelid & the screen door
nests
between the molars & under the tongue
it
can make a nation crazy
or
cause a dog to sit up and take notice
It's
been a crazy fucking year
full
of death and the fear that creates more death
full
of heightened alerts & habitual nightmares
full
of bedroom intruders dressed in terrorist beards
&
talking busted syntax on the Pentagon's porch
O
Northern Winds can you blow some uncommon sense
into
our nation down below?
Can
you wine & dine us this year with a cleansing tempest?
Can
you whistle and make our giant egos disappear?
Can
you help us elect a new president?
The
terrorists have murdered innocent lives
and
given America's insane right an unnatural gift
From
up here where the winds howl
it's
obvious nature abhors a fundamentalist judge
and
the whole pyramid scheme of corporate theft
The
Northern Winds blow the leaves hard
but
take time off so the trunks can rest
We
remember the World Wars and the inhuman slaughters
we
recall the old famines and the new disease
yet
have begun to build another dangerous century
Last
night ravens flew figure 8's near the cabin, playing
in
yr gusts. O Winds, we have learned to cross large continents
to
embrace our love. Can you shake us out of our future-destroying
weaponry
for a new start? Tell
the children:
another
new century can begin whenever we choose.
(written
in Alberta, Canada)
Playing
Catch with Cracked Globes
The first thing to remember is bend at the
knees & keep yr back
relatively
straight.
It could be a long day filled with leapfrogging
pitfalls
easy to throw out spinal discs or lose a wig
in the wind.
Most important is learning the two-arms-underneath
technique:
Let the globe come to you, breathe in slowly,
feel torso expand,
follow yr breath out yr nostrils, winding its
calm way through
the
wintry universe.
Visualize a cracked globe landing softly in
your cupped palms
and whatever else you do, don't squeeze! Or
shards will fly!
Anonymous millions have had throats slashed,
parliaments
dissolved,
for such frivolous crimes as a too-tight grip,
or turning away.
How return the globe to its sender depends
on its age.
If built early, circa 140 B.C. Greece, by Crates
of Mallus,
better
not flick your wrists.
Don't dig fingers in for a long throw, this
globe stops time
losing this one can incur the wrath of powerful gods no living
human
being remembers.
Such gods refused to stay still long enough
to be mapped.
Or breaking this ultimate globe could be a
sign fortune on
its
waywill you take such a gamble?
If the globe's from 1492, it is likely the
oldest in existence.
Put the vast blue Atlantic southern hemisphere
as it looked
before
transoceanic piracy
in yr throwing hand, raise it above your head & hold until
your
sender is ready.
If necessary, wait frozen & careful all night in that half-throwing
position
it's your butt on the line any time either
of you, sender or catcher,
drops
this ball.
Stare closely like a kabbalist at the letters
on yr globe & it will
slowly
reveal its codes,
its iconic, tectonic, temporal, and presentational
techniques.
In what ways is your globe already out of date
& yet also
a
compass for the future?
How does its cartography construct the world
as well as
reproduce
it?
Did he or she who created this globe pre-plan
where its initial
cracks
would appear?
Who agreed to draw its national borders in
solid black marker
rather
than dotted gray lines?
What social and cultural features has the author
left out by paying
such
close attention to proportion and typography?
Is this a Wolves of War globe, or a mapping
of peaceful
emigration
routes?
How this globe reveal its historical contingency?
How are border cross-pollinations illuminated
for a nation's
internet
connections?
Which regions are lost to the astronaut's eye
on a hazy day?
Did this globe's creator sufficiently appreciate
the value
of
a mercury-free River Nile?
Who decided to include those beautiful &
hideous flags?
What company or political foundation funded
the making
of
this globe anyway?
Have
your masking tape ready, your crazy glue, your double
lines
of epoxy,
steady your lavender candle to drip hot wax
to cover up the
smallest,
freshest cracks.
Trace the open space from its ruptured beginning
to end.
See if it passes through a country called East
Timor, Zaire,
Panama,
USSR.
See if the East and West of Germany are divided,
the North
&
South of Vietnam.
Does the globe say Israel and/or Palestine?
How many asterisks
appear
next to the name Jerusalem?
Is Algeria independent yet? Is Bosnia its own
nation?
Are no-fly zones still marked off in North
& South of Iraq?
Under which flag does Hungary fly? Is there
a sign saying
whether
its Jews have been placed on cattle cars yet?
How many
totalitarian regimes can you name touching at least
one
point in the breach?
Can you find any Native Americans on a 17th
century
European-made
globe?
How does your globe assign responsibility for
Africa's civil wars?
In 1966, a 95-year-old Parisian globe cracked
all the way open
to
reveal an unhatched egg
shake yr globe a little to see if there are
any secret prizes inside.
Then you can decide whether to try silver duct
tape or a
futuristic
glue,
or you can check www.repaircrackedglobes.com,
but few
international
surfers will find exact answers there.
If
the crack runs anywhere within continental United States,
you
have a complicated task
in your open palms. You are looking at a country
that has set
examples
of cultural freedom
and semi-democratic elections for much of the
world, a country
that
helped erase the axis of fascism
from your three-dimensional mid-20th century
map, that has
built
an unprecedented middle class
which doesn't look down often, that has committed
& sponsored
enough
violence in five-plus centuries
to embarass mapmakers from the top pole to
the bottom.
Look at three different globes from the 19th
centurycan you
see
how the numbers
of U.S. states and U.S.-claimed foreign terrorities
increase?
Does your globe use America as
shorthand for the U.S. of A.?
Feel the surface of the continent: Can you sense the gorgeous
Great
Lakes, the magnificent Mississippi,
the majestic Rocky Mountains, the Grand Canyon
wonder
of
the world?
Can you feel the dangerous radioactivity emanating
from land
lined
with plutonium hair triggers?
If you are rubbing a cracked globe on your
Nebraska rocking
chair
porch
remember that when you get too angry in Wichita
another player
shudders
on her Angolan rocks.
Meditate on this knowledge for 48 hours and
you will know
whether this is a globe that should be returned
via overhand toss
or
bowling ball roll,
or perhaps one of those rare globes that can
be drop-kicked
from
the White House lawn.
If yr globe was made during the new millennium
it will be difficult
to
locate origins of the crack.
There are Al Qaeda volcanos capable of causing
leaks anywhere.
There are Colombian army earthquakes, Chechnyan
firestorms,
religious
wars baking in the Kashmirian sun,
burial grounds housing too many bodies in the
Congolese streets,
AIDS spreading alarming rates in every nation
with human
populations
indexed on the map.
There is a mountain below the Equator called
IMF, a WTO River
whose
tributaries remain invisible.
There are oil tankers crossing oceans with
unknown corporate logos,
tribal warlords and paramilitary death squads,
homelessness
&
bone-thinning poverty.
The weather become too warm, the weapons too
destructive
and
too many.
There are random subatomic pin pricks capable
of carnage
modern
physics cannot yet explain.
Any of these could have cracked the globe you
are holding.
Can you examine your globe and discern whether
Lula has
been
elected president of Brazil?
This may be a globe with potential, perhaps
even a globe
worth
tossing north?
Although it looks stationary as you hold it
before you, arms
underneath
technique,
your globe is revolving at speeds too fast
for humans to follow.
Ignore my earlier advice. In truth, no matter
what method's
been
used thus far,
there has never been a foolproof way to send
back
a
cracked globe
without smashing it to bits. But you have made
the tough catch
&
must do something.
It will be difficult to invent a new way of
returning it safely
in times like these, the imagination is worth
more than
a
thousand pair of hands.