These women -- speaking about their lives around our world -- live in my poet's heart.
I listen as deeply as I can.
You may ask, why are so many of them in such desperate situations?
Aren't there women who are happy and successful?
A Budhist nun might smile softly, saying
"I would never deny them my compassion."
-- January to April 2006
In Sichuan
My husband has left for Shanghai.
He says he’ll bring us along soon.
Yeah, the sky will rain rice wine
tomorrow morning.
I’m alone with my son and daughter
in this village too poor to count
alone with a family
that’s forgotten our way.
I’ll entertain the lonely “gentlemen”
and tend my garden.
Plum blossoms are opening
but that’s the joy of
some other dynasty.
In West Virginia
How do I be a good mother
in these end times?
How do I tell Billie about the Rapture
when he just wants to pitch three strikes
or hit a home run?
How do I help Marie
through her first woman’s time
learning her
its ain’t really a curse.
How do I hold my husband close to me
when his buddies are trapped
in the mine,
none of the simple things
to save their lives
in the company’s budget.
How can I believe
I’ll be carried up
in our damned preacher’s revelations
when everyone I love is hurting,
right here
in this God forsaken hole.
In Vancouver
Sure, I’m the Goddess
or at least her potent surrogate!
I’m plugged into that wave of feminine power,
sure as shooting.
But the assholes of spiritual pretension
keep coming on to me
trying to tame me
to their dead father’s delusions.
And for the moment
I forget who I am
let myself be seduced
by their small change dreams
Looks like I just have to
stumble and fall over and over again
looking for the tracks of the masters
in the mud that remembers no tracks.
In limbo
I sit here looking out
with so many things to say -
my memory of the day
you picked a white rose
your tiny hand
drops of blood
on your thumb
holding the rose up to my eyes.
The tears in your eyes again
when you left me here
no way you could tend me
after that damned stroke
cut the pathways
from my thoughts
to my tongue
and my muscles.
Please Clara, just sit with me
a few minutes more.
Be still with me
so you can hear
my heart’s love for you.
In Pakistan
Mustaffa, my son, his leg is broken.
I bound it with rags and sticks
and the pain is less
now that it is so cold.
The ruins of our village
are higher than six thousand feet,
on the edge of a steep canyon.
My daughter’s coughing all the time
and she’s hot,
even with snow blowing into her face.
No tents have arrived here yet.
My husband died immediately,
rocks rolling across our field
carried him over the edge
of our canyon.
I could see him
trying to jump out of the way.
Last night our water froze solid
snow filled the shelter
we’ve tried to build in the rocky cup
of our crumbled house.
A helicopter flew over two days ago
a voice from the sky shouting
help is coming
tents stoves fuel food.
We ate the food they dropped
in one day.
Did they forget us?
The chilling winds
are too strong
for even birds to fly.
My sister’s husband
helped me dig the snow out of our ruins,
light a fire
My nieces and nephews are all dead,
all in school when the roof fell in.
Just before dawn
the snow stopped falling
and I could see the quarter moon
from our burrow of rags and straw
when the clouds opened.
My tears froze on my cheeks.
In Shanghai
I’m a Shanghai Woman!
I call the shots in my house.
My mate listens to my guidance
and follows.
No one quite understands
how this bending of power occurred,
but it is real.
Even my housekeeper
runs her house this way.
I work in international trade,
doing the deals that move our shit
into your superstores.
But I read the blogs from the students
trying to stop their schools from buying
varsity jackets and coffee mugs
from our sweatshops.
I can’t help but be on their side!
I traveled from Shanghai to Beijing in 1989.
I helped build the Statue of Freedom.
I saw my comrades die
in the massacre at Tiananmen Square.
I can’t forget our dream!
In Germany
for Suzanne
Am I nothing but a psycho bruised hostage
now bait for the sharks of attack media?
I love Iraq. I am a Muslim and wear the veil.
Germany may have birthed me
but I’ve become a woman in Iraq.
I carefully dig in the soil,
tracking each layer of our lives
digging through past centuries,
and tens of centuries.
I suffered the inevitable indignities of captivity
by a tribe that couldn’t understand
my true place in their heritage.
Now I suffer the inevitable indignities
of a past homeland that can’t understand
my dual loyalty, my need
for simple support and understanding.
Of course I am confused, inconsistent,
rambling, sorely distressed.
I live between the world of my birth
and the world of my rebirth.
No country owns me as its citizen
or gives me simple acceptance
of my distress and bewilderment.
In Michigan
What can these terrorists do to me?
My oldest son was ripped to pieces
by a roadside bomb in Karbala.
My middle son is burning up with meth,
his face like an old man’s mask.
My young daughter smiles brightly
in fantasies of her gone away daddy
while old men
stalk her in chat rooms.
I tried to tell Jason
that Iraq was already a lost war.
I tried to hold Aaron
in my love of his dear life.
I tried to show Jessie
that this morning’s sunrise
is all that she needs.
But my love was too feeble,
my speech too spoiled
for them to hear a word that I said.
What can these terrorists do to me now?
Near Ramallah
With bulldozers
they ripped our olive trees
from the ground
our apricot trees.
We are farmers not terrorists
but the Israeli soldiers
had their orders.
I remember the rich sweet taste
of those apricots
how my daughter smiled last June
when the juice dripped down her chin.
Is God pleased
when a soldier rips a tree
from the earth?
Will my husband and I
ever plant another tree?
In the far north of Canada
The ice sheets are far from our rocky shore.
We’ve seen the ice melt earlier each year
and our polar bear brothers and sisters
have trouble swimming
the full distance to land.
Their cubs drown, trying to cross the water.
The parents are sometimes too weak
to make it
not enough food to keep them strong.
My sons still bring back food for our families
but our lives are changing so fast.
I lost one son when he fell through the ice
where last year it would have been strong footing.
The scientists who test our blood tell us
we have poisons in our bodies
from thousands of miles away.
They tell us the whale
that we shared
with the bears
is now a totemic ancestor
for rich people in big cities.
Maybe it is time for me to leave my family
singing my death song.
but there is no ice sheet
to carry me away
In Liberia
I didn’t birth my boy
to be a murdering soldier.
Jamie was just a child
when they came to our village
just twelve years old.
They raped me and his sister
forced him to watch
beating him bloody
when he tried to stop them.
Months later his friend Malcolm escaped
spent a night hiding with us
telling how my son
had learned to kill.
His first victim was a comrade
who refused to carry his gun.
Jamie fired only
when they put a knife in his ear.
Then one day he sent a photo
an AK47 cradled in his arms
his face dark and mean.
He’d scrawled on the back
Mama, I am so very sorry.
Forgive me.
In the United States of Big People
I don’t remember just when it was
I gave up,
said, shit woman,
you’re just fat
and always will be.
Maybe it was just the way
he always looked at me,
never seeing what he wanted.
Maybe it was the third night in a row
that Todd “worked late”
and came home smelling
of some bitch’s perfume.
Now I know
I can’t just say its his fault,
I have to be responsible, you know.
No matter how faithful
he might be,
HA!
I’d still be the fat lady.
My doc says I’ll be dead
before my kids graduate
from high school.
My heart is really bad already
my blood pressure off the chart
I gasp going up a few stairs.
I can’t remember a time
when I didn’t see Fat Mary
In the mirror.
And what a curse,
these little tits of mine
on this body that always looked
big as an elephant’s ass.
I sit every afternoon,
watching Ophra,
sucking in inspiration
but its always those women
who can do it,
never a dream of me
being that strong,
that full of will
to be who I really am.
I laugh a lot, full bellied,
and I make my friends laugh.
How else can I keep
from blowing my top?
In Vermont
I am a poet.
Every morning
I walk along our stream
down to the shore
greeting the herons
and sandpipers.
I smell the skunk’s
early morning spray
hanging on
the blackberry vines
hours later.
I center my soul
in these few precious acres
but still my dreams are on fire
every night
with the deep pain
of my sisters and brothers
in shanty towns
and high towers.
On a foggy island off Scotland
New blue bruises shine
on my stomach and breasts
where the bastard beat me last night.
He’s learned to go for places
that don’t show to the neighbors.
I’d just said, Ian,
I’m thinking of going out on my own,
taking the kids.
I can’t live this way any more.
Every time he hit me,
he said I love you Jenny
I’ll never let you go away
I’ll follow you
I’ll find you.
I’d run away with the circus
if one came along.
I’d become a whore
before I’d take his shit again.
I have our tickets to Australia
and he’ll stay here in the peat bogs
too drunk to ever find me.
In Nigeria
My husband went out
with a gang from our village last night
and blew up the Shell pipeline.
All that oil and money
just goes somewhere else than here.
Another gang of Muslims rioted today,
killing people praying in our church.
That’s to show those white folks
up in the North
that they shouldn’t insult Mohammed.
They slashed my uncle and aunt
with their machetes.
I hold my son and daughter close to me,
loving them through these bad nights.
I whisper hopes in their ears
that I don’t know how to believe.
In London
I have enough money
to buy anything
I might ever desire.
But everything
that I might ever
really want
is priceless.
In my womb
You are dancing,
I feel your rhythms, my child
and I protect you
from this world’s poisons and spells
as best as a mother can.
I’ve even stopped watching the news,
letting my friends tell us
what really matters
the wild river safe now as home to eagles
the ancient tribe’s land in New Guinea
with dozens of creatures
we’ve never seen before.
I listen to the music we’ll share again
when you’re out here
in the rare air of our Earth
Mozart’s Trio Divertimento
the deep ringing of Balinese gamelan
Dvorak’s Serenades and Cello Concerto.
I pray to the gods
I imagine dwell within us
asking only that you and I
create new realities
way beyond the dark times
of your coming birth.
I’ll remember with every breath
the deep pure nature
pouring forth from your eyes.
May I never lock you into
my patterns
of desperate limitation
may I reflect back
your love and light
more often than not.
In Texas
In January the doctor told me
I'll die in six months
maybe I'll have eight
with chemo.
I saw the specialists
and thought about
my "death or death" choice
for just a little while
and finally I said,
no, thanks,
I think I'll just live .
My doctor smiled really happy
and told me about his friend
another doc who's survived
the terminal news
for years.
I'm crawling all over the healing webs.
I'm juicing beets and dandelion greens
cooking with turmeric,
like my doctor's friend from India.
Larry and I went to Hawaii for ten days
I'm visiting the people I love.
I have all this energy
from just deciding
to live
no matter what!