Today, September 11th, I’m sharing with you all a poem by Emmanuel Ortiz about war, remembering, silence, and voices.
But before I start this poem, an invitation:
In honor of the people who have died in violence around the world and as a result of September 11, 2001, please join Traction, Traction Action Fund, and the Independent Weekly next week for Robert Greenwald’s newest documentary:
WHAT: Rethink Afghanistan: film + discussion
WHEN: Sun., Sept. 20, 7 PM
WHERE: Manbites Dog Theater, 703 Foster St, Durham
TICKETS: $5 suggested donation
RSVP: rethink@getTraction.org
We’ll be joined after the film by Khalilah Sabra of the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation NC and other special guests to talk about where the war in Afghanistan has gotten us and what we can do for the future.
Also, this Wednesday, please come to the second-to-last of our Mad Money financial skills workshop series — Planning for the Long Haul: Real Estate and Retirement (9/16, 6:30 PM, Traction HQ, 1018 Broad St., money@getTraction.org). Financial planner Greg Davis will walk us through long-term savings and investments.
And now, the poem:
Before I Start This Poem (excerpted)
Emmanuel Ortiz, September 11, 2002
Before I start this poem,
I’d like to ask you to join me
in a moment of silence
in honor of those who died
in the World Trade Center
and the Pentagon
last September 11th.
I would also like to ask you
to offer up a moment of silence
for all of those who have been
harassed, imprisoned, disappeared,
tortured, raped, or killed
in retaliation for those strikes,
for the victims in both
Afghanistan and the U.S.
And if I could just add one more thing…
A full day of silence
for the tens of thousands of Palestinians
who have died at the hands of
U.S.-backed Israeli forces
over decades of occupation.
Six months of silence
for the million and-a-half Iraqi people,
mostly children, who have died of
malnourishment or starvation
as a result of an 11-year U.S. embargo
against the country.
Before I begin this poem:
two months of silence
for the Blacks under Apartheid
in South Africa,
where homeland security
made them aliens
in their own country.
…
A year of silence
for the dead in Cambodia and Laos,
victims of a secret war … ssssshhhhh ….
Say nothing … we don’t want them to learn
that they are dead.
Two months of silence
for the decades of dead
in Colombia, whose names,
like the corpses they once represented,
have piled up and slipped off
our tongues.
…
Before I begin this poem,
You want a moment of silence
You mourn now as if the world will never be the same
And the rest of us hope to hell it won’t be.
Not like it always has been
Because this is not a 9-1-1 poem
This is a 9/10 poem,
It is a 9/9 poem,
A 9/8 poem,
A 9/7 poem
This is a 1492 poem.
This is a poem about
what causes poems like this
to be written
…
This is a poem
for every date that falls
to the ground in ashes
This is a poem for the 110 stories
that were never told
The 110 stories that history
chose not to write in textbooks
The 110 stories that CNN, BBC,
The New York Times,
and Newsweek ignored
This is a poem
for interrupting this program.
And still you want
a moment of silence
for your dead?
We could give you
lifetimes of empty:
The unmarked graves
The lost languages
The uprooted trees and histories
The dead stares on the faces
of nameless children
…
If you want a moment of silence
Then stop the oil pumps
Turn off the engines and the televisions
Sink the cruise ships
Crash the stock markets
Unplug the marquee lights,
Delete the instant messages,
Derail the trains, the light rail transit
…
If you want a moment of silence,
Then take it
On Super Bowl Sunday,
The Fourth of July
During Dayton’s 13 hour sale
Or the next time your white guilt
fills the room where my beautiful
people have gathered
You want a moment of silence
Then take it
Now,
Before this poem begins.
Here, in the echo of my voice,
In the pause between goosesteps of the second
hand
In the space
between bodies in embrace,
Here is your silence.
Take it.
But take it all
Don’t cut in line.
Let your silence begin
at the beginning of crime
But we,
Tonight we will keep right on singing
For our dead.
Eileen
war protester, optimist, Tractivist
P.S. Emmanuel Ortiz is a third-generation Chicano/Puerto Rican/Irish-American community organizer and spoken word poet residing in Minneapolis, MN. He currently serves on the board of directors for the Minnesota Spoken Word Association, and is the coordinator of Guerrilla Wordfare, a Twin Cities-based grassroots project bringing together artists of color to address socio-political issues and raise funds for progressive organizing in communities of color through art as a tool of social change. The poem can be read in its entirety at Scoop Media.
