We are honored to accept your poems related to any of the issues of this blog, such as gendercide, girls, babies, mothers, sexual harassment, violence against women, empowerment or lack of regarding women. I am not too strict here, but it should have some relation.
Just post them in the comments area. I do moderate comments so be patient. It may take me a day or two to read it and post it. Usually I get to them the same day. Let's change the world, one poem at a time!
Assuming we get enough quality posts, I will pick one poem per week to showcase on the front page.
Just post them in the comments area. I do moderate comments so be patient. It may take me a day or two to read it and post it. Usually I get to them the same day. Let's change the world, one poem at a time!
Assuming we get enough quality posts, I will pick one poem per week to showcase on the front page.
For Reference
ReplyDeleteI. My thesaurus doesn’t have an entry for “genocide.”
Perhaps because some horrors are too strong for synonyms. Or perhaps because genocide
happens to other people, other nations, and Random House cares more about foreign book rights
than it does foreign people, so Americans don’t need more than one word for it. But remnants of
what might have been litter roads all over the world. Shells of potential, allowed little more than
a first breath, get slaughtered on sight, as though human life amounts to anything cheaper than
priceless.
II. My dictionary pretends that American’s don’t have a role in this.
As though we don’t commit violence against nation upon nation, that we don’t murder each
other, that we’re not driving this nation to suicide. PETA screams that meat is murder, but
in some countries, daughters don’t get the care afforded to animals bound for slaughter. In
America, we don’t care about children only allowed to live for a moment. Who get bludgeoned
like prizefighters who can defend themselves. Who get frozen like leftovers that nobody wants to
eat. Who get ignored like raisins in the sun—to wither, to explode, the outcome doesn’t matter.
Thank you, Allyson! I love the insights and power of your poetry. Do you have any commentary about this, how you came to this idea or the story behind the poem so to speak?
ReplyDeleteThe word "holocaust" is actually what got me inspired. I wasn't sure if I wholeheartedly agreed that you should call this issue "The Other Holocaust," not out of insensitivity to Jewish people, but because I wasn't sure "holocaust" was the exact right word (as a poet, I'm a big believer in choosing the absolute right word every time).
ReplyDeleteSo I turned to my dictionary, and then I started doing Ellarain'e Lockie's "Thesaurus is Not a Four-Letter Word" exercise, mapping out all of the different synonyms, and the synonyms of synonyms. Along the way, I realized my thesaurus (Random House Roget's College Thesaurus, 2000) literally did not have an entry for the word "genocide." That ultimately became the impetus for the poem: the way books and media ignore, erase, obfuscate. The way roles are minimized, the way ignorance perseveres.
(Oh, and I ultimately decided that I did agree with your use of the word "holocaust.")
from Paucis Verbis blog:
ReplyDeleteFeeding Molek
The rock still stands --
growth of bushes,
briers, and half-dead flowers
covering its north side --
the south side shows
its grooved-smooth-gray-top,
this ragged side, chipped,
well-worn from use.
~ * ~
For thousands of years
it was a place of
fresh-born scrub-bushes
and twisted-tiny
crawling roses. The rock
at noon, the hottest hour
of the day, so the it
would pull the seeping blood
deep into its skin.
Faster than room and space made --
bodies slain and pushed aside --
they lined up with,
the crying children
held tight to breast, shoulder, face --
whispering, "remember the honor,
necessity. You must die."
In this way they fed Molek
the blood of their children
for days-on-end, one-by-one.
Crying babies, death knell ringing
across a summer sky while
the hot-wet-smell of blood
filled the breeze, floated away.
~ * ~
One hundred, two hundred, three
thousand, four thousand, more --
slaughtered into dark-gray silence,
quiet like the years
passing after them.
Two thousand years,
countless days, and
100-millions-girls later.
~ * ~
They come to the rock,
clear the way for sacrifice --
the blood, child blood, warm blood
splashes on the crawling roses.
The lines grow long, filled
with crying children
held tight to shoulder,
breast, face -- whispering,
"remember the honor, necessity.
You must die."
In this way we feed Molek
the blood of our children
for days-on-end, one-by-one.
Crying babies, death-knell ringing
across a summer sky while
we pretend its an illusion --
turn away, hide our eyes.
The rock still stands --
the growth of bushes,
briers,
and half-dead flowers
covering its north side;
its south side chipped,
well-worn from use --
waiting.
~July 2012
This poem was written for the 100-million-girls website.
Artwork Credit: Artwork by (c) Tirin, aka Tilde Carlsten. Please visit her blog (offering a variety of interesting topics and great artwork HERE.) Thanks and gratitude to Tirin for the use of this picture.
Citations:
Wikipedia contributors. "Moloch." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 11 Jul. 2012. Web. 21 Jul. 2012.
Molek - explanation from Wikipedia:
As a god worshipped by the Phoenicians and Canaanites, Moloch had associations with a particular kind of propitiatory child sacrifice by parents. Moloch figures in the Book of Deuteronomy and in the Book of Leviticus as a form of idolatry (Leviticus 18:21: “And thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Moloch”). In the Hebrew Bible, Gehenna was initially where apostate Israelites and followers of various Baalim and Caananite gods, including Moloch, sacrificed their children by fire (2 Chr. 28:3, 33:6; Jer. 7:31, 19:2–6).
Moloch has been used figuratively in English literature from John Milton's Paradise Lost (1667) to Allen Ginsberg's Howl (1955), to refer to a person or thing demanding or requiring a very costly sacrifice.
What a moving poem, Marissa! Thank you for sharing. Of course, we now that the practice of infanticide does go back thousands of years, but we also know that there has been a huge increase in the last twenty years and that the increase began with the wealthy and the most highly educated. We also know that in the Indian, Vietnamese and I think Chinese populations in America and the UK, we are seeing unnaturally high male sex ratios as well, even higher than in their home countries. Even the leaders of these countries are getting worried about the severe shortage of marriage age women now and over the next 50 years. Demographers say even if we could stop all now, it will take until 2050 to right the shortage of women. Thanks again for sharing. Beautiful!
ReplyDeleteHi Sheree,
ReplyDeleteI just came across 100 Million Girls on Twitter yesterday...THANK YOU so much for your work to bring attention to saving our baby girls!! Here is a poem I wrote a few years back when I thought about what I would like to leave the world if I had only 1 year to live: empowering words for girls around the world. I've self-published it into a picture book as well as a print poster to raise funds for global girls education & girls empowerment workshops. May we all work together for our girls of the world.
Thank you,
Lola
...
For My Girls
My dear girls around the world
There are things I want to say.
I want to tell you why you’re special
And how you change the world today.
My lovely girls around the world
There’s a beauty in you I see.
It’s not your face or what you wear
It’s the happy smile you share with me.
My beautiful girls around the world
I sense a power in you.
It’s not your body or how you move
It’s the kind of things you do.
My brilliant girls around the world
I love the words you speak.
Always know that you have a choice
To create how you think.
My confident girls around the world
You are strong and tall.
Use your voice to express yourself
And move hearts, one and all.
My sweet girls around the world
You have amazing hearts.
When you nurture and you love
You shine among the stars.
My courageous girls around the world
Your fears give you fire.
You show there’s only room for dreams
And living your heart’s desires.
My wise girls around the world
Live the nature in you.
Know that strength and grace from this Earth
Lie within you too.
My magnificent girls around the world
You hold so much light.
Just by shining the truth in you
You expand the energy of life.
My visionary girls around the world
You were born to lead.
Hold some hands and show the way
You’ll discover what you seek.
My divine girls around the world
When all is said and done…
Just be happy and full of passion
Because being you is so much fun!
Along this journey if you ever forget
Come back to these words and say
“I know I’m special in all that I am
And I change the world today”.
Copyright 2010 Lola Tsai
www.oneglowinglife.com