Words of Resistance Poetry

English 2367 - Common Place Book

[daschlitt]

Soiled Gifts

Walking into a store

Meeting on the street

Running on rooftops, through alleys, over walls

Studying at school

All the little moments I act

I never asked for this privilege

Followed by the shopkeeper

Watched by her; she clutches her purse

Arrested by the police - no leniency

Impoverished, without a degree

All these moments acting upon me

I never asked for these disadvantages

We never asked for this

[daschlitt]

Tumblr tag - Word Cloud: Inspiration for today’s assignment. Thanks http://post-theory.com/pretty-cloud/maker!

[daveypetey]

They use words like “casualties” to speak of murder.

Aracelis Girmay, Arroz Poetica (via daveypetey)

The “they” referred to here is those in charge of the War on Terror. These people, like those before them who have lead wars from afar, use language to distance themselves and minimize the reality of their actions. Murder suggests a crime, evil, worthy of punishment. This word does not fit in their vocabulary of a just a war, so they use “casualty.” A casualty is an accidental death, a sad yet necessary byproduct of achieving some goal. Girmay argues that using the word casualty is a verbal cover up of the real murder which took place.

[reimer2367-blog]

a god who spits blood from tuberculosis and doesn’t even have enough for bus fare

Francisco X. Alarcon (via reimer2367)

This stanza, written by Francisco Alarcon, frankly captures a weak and powerless god that many people can relate too. This “relatablity” is the power of the stanza. God is almost always described as perfect, an incorruptible. No one can relate to this kind of being though because no person is perfect. People can understand and trust and love a god who can be sick and knows what it’s like to feel poor because they see themselves in this god.

[reimer2367-blog]

My enemies ride jets to parties. They are not tied up in pens in Guantanamo Bay. They are not young children throwing rocks. My enemies eat meats & vegetables at tables in white houses where candles blaze, cast shadows of crosses, & flowers.

Aracelis Girmay (via reimer2367)

This quote from Aracelis Girmay recasts America’s War on Terror in a darker light. Girmay’s enemies are the rich and powerful in America who orchestrate the war for their own profit and/or power. She demonizes these powerful people by implicitly implicating them for putting people in pens like pigs and suggesting children are the real enemies of freedom. Girmay’s message resonates because those who run the war on terror have successfully lead most American’s to believe this falsehood, while in reality, they have gotten away with great abuses and atrocities.

[daschlitt]

&, I promise you, they will not call you name, Hassna  Ali Sabah, age 30, killed by a missile in Al-Bassra, or you, Ibrahim Al-Yussuf, or the sons of Sa'id Shahish on a farm outside Baghdad, or Ibrahim, age 12, as if your blood were any less red, as if the skins that melted were any less skin, & the bones  that broke were any less bone,

Arroz Poetica -Aracelis Girmay

[daschlitt]

a flame-hey metallica hey britanny hey airless hey fuse, I

fire -Nick Flynn

[daschlitt]

the father pointing a finger at everyone a finger we can't even look at

jesus knew -Nick Flynn

[daschlitt]

a jobless god a striking god a hungry god a fugitive god an exiled god an enrage god

Prayer -Alacron

[daschlitt]

YOU in whose giant beehive brain the whole human race is but     one microsecond of memory

Prayer to a Computer - Olga Cabral

[daschlitt]

in place of New Jersey      place a plastic New Jersey

The Invention of New Jersey -Jack Anderson

[daschlitt]

the one voice of the one collective dream, industrial,  amphetamine, and the starts unmoving-

Techno -Dana Levin

[daschlitt]

you get when you are looking  at your child, turn your head, then, poof, no more child. that felling. that's black.

[daschlitt]

They are just being kids. Come on, no need to get all KKK on them, you say. Now there you go, he responds.

Citizen: An American Lyric - Claudia Rankine

[daschlitt]

6. oil heavy starlight

alternate names for black boys -Danez Smith

[daschlitt]

but i've been watching from the slaughterhouse. ever since you named me edible. tossed in  a cookie at the end.

To the Man Who Shouted "I Like Pork Fried Rice" at Me on the Street - Franny Choi

[daschlitt]

See, I only date hood. My last man? He never even met his father. Four women, six kids

Some Instructions on Black Masculinity Offered to my Black Friend by the White Woman He Briefly Dated, A Monologue -Ross Gay