On February 17, 2015, Code Pink organized a press conference at the Oakland, California Federal Building, calling for opposition to a new Authorization for the Use of Military Force and the end to endless war in the Middle East and beyond.
Speakers included WSLF executive director Jackie Cabasso, who also spoke on behalf of United for Peace and Justice, Emily Yates, Iraq War veteran, Cat Brooks of ONYX/Black Power Network, Paul Cox of Veterans for Peace, Stephen McNeil of American Friends Services Committee, Janet Weil, CODEPINK staffer and military family member, and a member of Congress member Barbara Lee’s staff, whow read a statement from Congress member Lee.
Dulce Et Decorum Est III & A Taste of Armageddon
(Or the Empire has no Clothes but a Disposition Matrix)
In due homage
to Horace, Owen & Mikhail
i humbly nod
for how sweet & glorious
it must be to kill or die
for God & country
via pompous duty
asphyxiatingly-wrapped
in faux honor
and a fools pride
so c’mon kiddies,
any up for good jingo sport?
who’s hungry & poor,
who wants to play
the hubris ‘anything for profit’ killing game?
As newspapers rah rah
pied piper patriotism
with journalistic integrity
& objectivity ha ha!
as a new battle/fear lies just around the corner
& armed forces day just weeks away hooray!
rally loyal citizens
to whitewash warm innocuous blood
off disgraced musket & sullied polluted flag
strike up the marching parade
manifested by destiny down main street usa hey hey!
Awaken & open thine eyes
chauvinistic folk
come & see
your overseas deeds of nefarious brutality
As you’re liable
for this appalling
tax-paid supported violence
you’ve exported to hamlets & villages
Assaulting families
who’ve never
did you any harm
in lands you’ve never heard of
or care less for
so step on up
one & all
Take a trip
to the overflowing morgues
filled with small smashed bodies
once toddlers
full of laughter & life
Deeply inhale
the rancid stench
of scorched flesh
crispy burnt
to a black bubbly mass
by phosphorus
Gaze into doll dead eyes
frozen forever
by shock & awe
renditioned
via your God blessed terror from above
From atop a cold gurney
a stiff finger of a tiny hand
amidst a mish-mosh of mangled flesh
bulls-eyed at you war supporters
Watch
as grief-stricken father’s
zombie-wander
in shattered silence
sifting through ragged debris
devastating destruction
searching
for lost sons
missing daughters
Discovering
ripped wet mangled body parts
strewn out as pieces of a human jig-saw puzzle
taking home
the ear, the hand, the foot
to be quietly buried
while 6000 miles away
heroes giggle and snicker
calling this crime
‘bugsplat’
Harken
to the heart-piercing shrieks
as soul-torn asunder mothers
wail like howling wild animals
as they find their loves buried
broken & bloody
in the rubble
of your glorious works
Then if you can
please explain
to the unresponsive moaning
neonatal orphan
why your armed forces
just murdered his parents
by accident
then wave a condolence payment
like juicy bait in his face
Celebrate
as your special op-forces
silently & quickly
dig out bullets
from civilian bodies
to cover their tracks
from being at the wrong address
again
Declare as a national holiday
murdered women at a bridal shower
or when
4 kids are droned to smithereens
while tending sheep
rejoice
in exported evil exploits
as great american victories
for which your war crimes always are
Trust flim-flam,
the PR propaganda spin
from subjective mass media
obey leaders and church leaders
pay your taxes
which finances anglo-terrorism
through illegal & immoral aggressive violence
Raise your filthy faux flag
higher higher ever higher
to cover the rising pile where the butchered lie
however
dear good christian citizens
no civic rag
could ever soar over
the sick slaying of the innocent
Consider Fallujha
surrounded & caged
as the cowering cringing unarmed civilian inhabitants
are shot, burned & barbequed
like slaughtered sitting ducks
in a ‘free-fire zone’ shooting gallery
Ponder
upon your sanctimonious attack
at a school in Bajour
where 69 children are massacred by joystick
as you deceive yourself
into believing
it did not happen
washing your hands
turning as you walk away
This is Sand Creek
Wounded Knee
My Lai
Haditha
too many other mass-media
contorted & distorted great triumphs
To wit
no doubt in my mind
the next war crime called
a ‘battle’
or a ‘humanitarian bombing’
will be patriotically anointed too
of course
ta ta
vision of humanity
by toto che handala
Someday
i see
a time
when all of humanity
becomes one nation
a species
living in harmony
by symbiosis
a race
no longer
at war with itself
the community of humanity
united by their love
not separated by their hate
i no longer see
the extremes of rich and poor
the inequity
of the have and have not’s
when a population
is no longer consumed
by its hedonistic pursuits
its fidelity and allegiance
is to humanism and compassion
tolerance and unselfishness
A vision of humanity
by which today
you may say
i am
just a wide-eyed dreamer and unrealistic
but I state unequivocally
that this day is nigh
and coming bright
as a mid afternoons sun
though you may not perceive it
since it is your reality
that is a temporal allusion
The epiphany
when humanity discovers its humanity
Is no longer
a mass of locust
consuming blindly into obesity
when we clean up our mess
return this place
back into the garden
that it once was
This day
is irrefutable
because
it is inevitable
faith
is the strength
but foresight is lucid as chi
for are we destined
for goodness not evil
are we not
scattered seeds
of an immeasurable mystery?
Within
each and everyone of us
you deem judged
the most vile
the most divine
we are all destined
to walk the same path
that path
is back
to the source of the infinite cloud
to the Dao, maker of light
What amazes me
by far
is this future
so few embrace
At the tips of their fingers
they feel it not
in front of their faces
still they see it not
but I know
its there
just as surly as you are here
and I am not
it is you
understand?