Monday, December 29, 2008

It won't make any difference, but I'll say it anyway: Stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it, stop.

The other day, I was reading up on the death of Harold Pinter, and in his Nobel acceptance speech, this extract from a Neruda poem came up -

And one morning all that was burning,
one morning the bonfires
leapt out of the earth
devouring human beings --
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandits with planes and Moors,
bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,
bandits with black friars spattering blessings
came through the sky to kill children
and the blood of children ran through the streets
without fuss, like children's blood.

Jackals that the jackals would despise,
stones that the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,
vipers that the vipers would abominate!

Face to face with you I have seen the blood
of Spain tower like a tide
to drown you in one wave
of pride and knives!

Treacherous
generals:
see my dead house,
look at broken Spain :
from every house burning metal flows
instead of flowers,
from every socket of Spain
Spain emerges
and from every dead child a rifle with eyes,
and from every crime bullets are born
which will one day find
the bull's eye of your hearts.


Today, I've been trying to read about Gaza, I've been trying to understand the hows and whys, trying to imagine a solution, but my mind keeps going back to this poem - and I don't read it as a threat, I read it as a statement of fact. Too much murder and death and horror and it will only breed more.

2 comments:

nmj said...

hey honey, it's not rocket science (excuse the pun), but the only way they get away with it is cos of usa backing, i will be interested to hear what obama has to say, but i will be afraid to listen... i sense that israel is very much taking advantage of the transient old president out-new president in situ... meanwhile a gazan mother of five dead daughters weeps with all the others. Pinter was a signatory of Jews for Justice for Palestinians, their statement on the latest attack on Gaza is here. x

Anonymous said...

That's a very interesting link, NMJ. I've bookmarked it so I can have a proper and thorough look through the site. Pinter is (okay, was) a brilliant, significant playwright (I totally love some of his stuff, while others leave me quite cold - but that's neither here nor there, really, given that I'm hardly an authority. Just not able to resist these asides, they come thick and fast these days, it seems), and in many ways I think he was a brilliant and bravely outspoken public figure, but his politics (I feel) suffered from a dogmatic anti-Americanism. For while there are multi many good reasons to be anti-American (referring to global politics, k, not on a personal vendetta against American folks), doggedly-dogmatic support of America's enemies (and conversely, opposition of those whom America supports) will lead people up some funny tracks. It did Pinter - I'm sure you saw this article (under my name), but bringing it here just to support my ramblastic reply.

But back to the issue - yes, the Palestinian suffering goes on because US politics allow it to, I agree. Who needs rocket science? We certainly don't, sweet NMJ.

It's late, I'm making less sense than I'd like... x