WORLD POETRY DAY - Readings from Owen Sound, Ontario
Dialogue Poetry – Owen Sound, Ontario
March 21st is the traditional day for kicking off Words Aloud poetry Cooperative’s yearly reading series. Since we have discovered last year that this is also the date of World Poetry Day sponsored by Dialogue Poetry, we have enthusiastically merged these intents. When I first began to advertise this year’s event, many of our traditional supporters contacted me expressing their interest in reading their own poetry. Some of these inquiries were shy, and we discovered a wealth of previously ‘hidden’ poets in Grey and Bruce Counties of southern Ontario.
Our featured poets were Gloria Alvernaz Mulcahy from London, Andrea Jarmai from Toronto and Penn Kemp from London.
Gloria read very personal poems laced with shamanistic allusions. Her poem welcoming her grand-daughter into this world is reproduced below. Andrea Jarmai read from her Chapbook, “I, Ahab”, poems from her first full-length poetry book due in 2004, and translations she is doing of the Hungarian poet, George Faludy.
Penn Kemp’s work followed in her own footsteps, something she started for World Poetry Day in 2002. Her poem, Poem for Peace in Two Voices, has now been translated into over 60 languages. I am one of the translators, both into Hungarian and into the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic script. Karl Backhaus, the German translator, read, along with Andrea, the Mennonite translation; Andrea and I ‘performed’ the Hungarian in lively sound poetry; Dan Shatil read the Poem for Peace in Hebrew; Gloria and I took Anne Welwood’s Latin translation and turned it into a Gregorian Chant. Then Penn and I chanted the ancient Egyptian, and Penn, together with Gavin Stairs, performed the ‘mystery language’.
This year was our sixth annual start at the Coffee Bean in Owen Sound. 47 people crammed the space and there was a lively trade for poetry books during the intermission. Each featured poet was followed by three others. We heard poetry from Anne Duke Judd, Jennifer Frankum, Dawna Proudman, Judy Lowry, Beverley Viljakainen, Paul Scott, Don Willmott, Doug Cleverley, Claire Fanger, Astrid Wayman and me (Daniel Kolos). Those who kindly sent their poem by e-mail will have it published on the Dialogue Poetry 2003 website: http://www.dialoguepoetry.org/ebooks/2003_anthology.pdf
POEM FOR
PEACE IN TWO VOICES
Calm came clear
of cloud
early one morning
before things started
Calm came at noon
A cardinal perched
on black bough
in blazing sun.
Calm came at night
stretching as cats do,
constant stretch and change.
Forsythia brightened
as the house slept.
Now calm come
in the face of
brawl
Penn Kemp
London, Ontario
Poem for Peace
in Two Voices in many translations can now be heard on the London
Music Archive at http://chrw.usc.uwo.ca/mp3/2002/Kemp,%20Penn%20-%20Poems%20For%20Peace/kemp.htm
The poem and thirty of the translations can
also be heard on www.germination.mytown.ca.
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Peace
Poem Two
There is no "they" -
it is our children's homeland
made a battlefield,
our skies befouled,
our streets aflame,
our sisters mourning.
Turn off this prime-time war!
Tune to homeless and hungry,
move beyond greed and its wars.
With a parent's voice
call "Enough!"
and let fly the doves of peace.
-Anne Duke Judd
Port Elgin, Ontario
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* * * * *
*
"...the Butterfly Effect - the notion that a butterfly
stirring the air today in Peking can transform
storm systems next month in New York."
Chaos: Making a new Science by James Gleick
BEYOND CHAOS
Look not to this day's world for hope:
Chaos we have, and raging storms.
Cloud thunder - then famine and flood.
Bomb thunder - then destruction and blood.
Lamentations rise up, and tears flow down.
The valley of the shadow is all valleys.
Dazed millions sit and stare at sitcoms,
while, in the corporate castles high above,
drunken dancers spin the wheels of misfortune
to shape the fate of the unwitting world.
In such a time of turbulence as this,
who dares declare the planet's future bright?
or claim that peace and justice will prevail?
The omens all portend calamity,
and chicken entrails presage doom.
Yet in the chaos-scholars' books one finds
some unintended flecks of light.
Chaos can unfold exquisite beauty -
though ever with such complex design
that only the one next fold can be foreseen:
All further futures preclude prophesy.
The least significant of beginnings
may bloom with unexpected power:
a flitting insect stirring the air
may change storm systems far away.
Hope looks today to butterflies -
bringing their gifts of loveliness and life:
the delicate tracery of their wings,
profusion of colour in balanced symmetry,
and a generative task in Nature's flow.
Let us then follow the butterflies -
not claiming to grasp the immensities,
nor soaring on pre-planned pathways to the stars,
but seeking fragrances and flowers,
and planting the pollen of life abundant.
In knowing chaos, we know too
the tiny turbulence we stir
may someday cumulate to quell
the rushing eagle's hurricane
and then, perhaps, create a rainbow.
Don Willmott
Owen Sound, Ontario
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Rage Blooms Like a Minefield
annihilation
like a
quiet lake wrapped in night
invites
escape from fight and flight
sometimes
in my quiet house my cat purrs for no reason
my
abdomen hollowed out
with my
permission
less
than empty
kissed
by a breeze softer than sorrow
my
mother shuns my daughter
who
stole her brush and a doll
that
was mine when I was a girl
Amanda’s
hair runs like seaweed in a shallow stream
a stick
man with wide obsidian eyes
told me
he thought of fighting in Vietnam
preferable
to feeling nothing
earl
grey tea, roses, Bonnie’s laugh
teenagers
painted Columbine red
a
six-year-old in Flynt shot a little girl
the more
they bleed the harder we try to erase them
amethyst,
garnet, turquoise, amber
meal
times I watched spittle stretch and shrink
dad
chewed his food
a good
man with a short fuse
patchwork
quilts worn thin as skin
victims
morph into bullies
wiping out
words they hate more than war:
fear,
powerlessness, grief
criticism,
racism, misogyny
chafe
like a knife on stone
inside
my brain wanting to get out
cool
cotton pillowcases just before sleep
"sluts"
boys call girls who give blow jobs
"kings"
boys call the recipients
desperate
to be liked
snapdragons,
foxglove, pansies, calendula
Oklahoma
City
The
World Trade Towers
the
President demands his turn
lavender
and mint soap, sheepskin slippers, blueberries
rage
blooms like a minefield
sometimes
I freeze
sometimes
I dance
Dawna
Proudman
Durham,
Ontario
* *
* * * * *
* *
I, Ahab
With this iron I do thee wed.
There are ropes attached, mind;
What hate has joined in one thrust
Indifference on one part
Won’t soon put asunder
The bond.
I know no impediment to love in fire and
thunder.
I kiss; consume now what you left me
The last time we met.
On this Manila cable,
The widow’s son, sworn to go
On pain of dismembered’immolay to the end
Of his tow; below; and there perish thought.
Perdition be damned, and so too Ahab – the
arm
Of the law, with one leg to stand on –
Biblical authority – I come; a blow for a
blow.
Pitiless Titans, feasting on kindred, we
both;
The sin mine alone; because
I know.
I have heard the mermaids screaming
On Sirius’ invisible shores:
“No more, thou cannibal, marked Zoroastrian,
Lightning-struck Cain;
Nommo!”
Oh yes, they will scram for me.
Hot oil-blood poured in the ear of my
half-shell, that font,
Spermaceti of kings, I’ll own;
We deaf hear the ocean,
Hear it roar, hear it roll, hear it call us
all Ishmael
(Dispossessed children of the lesser part of
God,
The smaller ball),
As you all hear it in a conch placed
adjacent,
But – I quote the raven: that’s all.
I hear; I obey; I go;
Where no man must go before me,
Virgin white Kali; I go.
To die; to sleep;
Perchance to know.
Andrea Jarmai
Toronto, Ontario
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*
Baghdad Burning :
A Verse Essay
I.
In the second half of the ninth century
Abu Yusuf Ya'qub ibn Ishaq al-Kindi
the Philosopher of the Arabs (noted for his creation
of an Arabic vocabulary for philosophy)
taught in the Abbasid court in Baghdad
where the founding of the Bayt al-Hikma (the House of Wisdom)
for translating works of foreign learning
enabled his schooling in the arts
of the Persians, the Hindus and the Greeks. The debate
about the legitimacy of philosophy for orthodox Islam began also
with al-Kindi -a debate now considered to have been lost
though Baghdad remained luminous for years,
a massive source of intellectual wattage
burning right through the tenth century, when Ibrahim ibn Sinan
studied tangents to circles, the apparent motion
of the sun, the geometry of shadows
and the quadrature of the parabola, refining the theories
of his more famous grandfather Thabit ibn Qurra (who had begun
fifty years earlier to improve upon Archimedes'
views of integration), the two of them
laying a foundation for what Isaac Newton
(a late bloomer of no special promise) in 1687
turned into the Principia, perhaps the greatest
mathematical treatise ever written.
In those days Baghdad was the battery
storing a virtue whose burning lit
for centuries beyond itself
what had not yet become the West.
II.
Upon algebra (from the Arabic, al-jabr,
meaning 'reunion of broken parts')
Newton built the calculus
which seemed harmless in itself,
but there is still so much history here
that is unknown or poorly glossed;
I have heard that the Assyrians
have long had the custom
of concealing Syriac manuscripts
in the caves of northern Iraq. Still dark
what other histories (or whose)
lie hid there - an uncertainty
about to be fixed forever
unseen like the position of a black hole
for if Baghdad is burning again
this will come as no shock
to anyone, since where else have we sought
so diligently and so long to grasp
what we did not understand?
So little beyond what we learned
from the Kitab Sirr al-Asrar
(the Book of the Secret of Secrets,
the most popular text
in medieval Europe)
can now be told of Baghdad
resting in the crepuscular dawn
beneath the cold sparkling
from the anti-aircraft guns,
since anything of wisdom it still holds
is claimed either to be ours already
or to be lethal to us and thus
less esoteric than classified.
By Claire Fanger
RR, Hanover, Ontario
* * * *
* * * * *
*
War is Not a Solution
War is not a solution,
It is the ultimate failure
of humanity’s promise,
The final act of moral and
ethical denial of love,
When ignorance and fear lead
us to reptilian responses:
Striking out and own the
hope we are make of,
The possibility we refuse to
realize through our being…
Our raceless oneness truth
of mortal diversity!
On the threshold of
discovery…
…that peace is that
awareness.
Paul Douglas
Scott
03/08/03
Williamsford,
Ontario
* * * *
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* * * * *
* * * * *
*
WE ARE THE WORLD . . .
We
are the world, the world is us, he said.
What
kind of riddle is this? I mused.
But
that was a long time ago;
And
I’m quite a lot older and a little bit wiser now.
Recently,
I asked a child of four what her other name was, purely for the joy of
hearing her say, “Viljakainen”.
And
then she asked, “And what is yours?”
“Viljakainen,”
I replied.
To
her quizzical “How come?” her older sister whispered in her ear, “Because we
are related.”
When
does the us-them begin?
When
are we to know that we are all related and not merely to some?
That
this must be understood, if we are to be truly human, is evidenced, is
it not, by the rare shouts, always from moving vehicles, to those of us on
Durham street corners holding placards, “War is Not a Solution,” “An Eye for an
Eye Makes the Whole World Blind” and so on.
Why
does anyone feel the need to say, let alone to shout, “Kill them all and let
God take care of it!” Or “Get outa here! We’re gonna blow them all up!” or even
“Go Home!” when we are already home?
This,
too, is an apt issue upon which to contemplate, to meditate, to pray, and to
act.
For
this is the stuff of War.
Does
not every war, every act of violence begin in the mind of a single angry,
insecure, afraid person, whose point of view is then validated by other angry,
insecure, frightened people?
For
God alone’s sake, America, however you choose to define God, wake up, open your
mouths and speak for genuine Truth, Liberty and Justice!
For
you too are the world (not that you seem to have ever doubted it!).
The
world is also you.
“God
bless America,” your President is fond of saying, although it’s now been
changed to “God bless our country!” (Are you already in hiding, Mr. Bush?)
Come
out and participate . . .
Why
not God bless the world?
All
of us are the world; the world is “us”, lower case, not capital U period
capital S period . . . the children, women, men, animals, birds, plants, air,
earth, water, and sky that sustain us all.
God
has blessed every one of us —with intelligence, with life.
The
time has come that so many of us have long awaited . . .
Hating
is a luxury we can no longer afford, even in jest.
I
need never again to hear a friend’s very young child say, “Tell them not to
hurt the children!”
Gratitude,
Cooperation, Love, and Truth await our deployment. So be it!
Beverley
Viljakainen
Poems
for the Spring Equinox and for Peace
March 21, 2003
RR Priceville, Ontario
* * * * * * * * *
what the winds have scattered
God knows this shaking
scatters understanding to the four winds
so that neighbours kill one another
over property and belief
empires crumble
borders are drawn and redrawn
and diplomacy bows to the rule of the gun
but here and there amongst the chaos
seeds of wisdom proffer peace
for all is one great word, one world, one love
all belief is one
the many are one
though invented conflicts and differences
divide us
yet we can unite in one purpose and desire
bringing to life our vision of peace
as seeds sown on fertile ground
before the rains come
soon ripen with abundant offerings
to give thanks for these
we need only be quiet
gather what the winds have scattered
and share the blessings with
All Our Relations
Doug Cleverley
December 1991
Owen Sound, Ontario
*
* * * * *
* * *
The eleventh Hour has flown.
Slinking away
From howling gloom-gray mound
Stumbling down
- scattering silver from a thorn-ton sow-skin purse,
Shame steaming through his silken skin-trade shirt –
He hurtles into liquid Black.
A silvery sound follows him,
A song of words forever lost before begun –
Words not meant for him, not ever, ever meant for him.
“Soon you shall be with me in my Heavens.”
Somewhere
Between the shud-shocked hill
- the Cross –
And the ghostly limping tree, His mother stood
Purple against the shrieking sky –
Hell-bent he paused,
Preening his dank dark locks
Screening her though hollow fingers.
She has long-since cruelly shorn her hair
Her eyes, once incandescent
Animal-proud mother-eyes,
Narrow now, scan him dimly now –
Her mouth seamed and prim
Asks,
“Son, as you Truly my son Judas, son?”
Caged in guilt
He hunts in this Real Night
(but knows it isn’t there)
A hint of light.
Eyes groundward
He hears her palely say,
“your hair – it was your glory once –
Is still quite nice.”
Then
“Son, there is a bitter wind.
Take my coat.”
Her words hang like questions.
And through the doom of his cursed culpability
Her echoes search into his tomb
Of ever-lost humanity.
Astrid Wayman (March 21, 2003)
Eugenia, Ontario
* * * * * * * *
It
is Lent. The armies are dug in throughout the desert.
Their
rations are bacon and eggs in the morning, steak and potatoes at night.
They
will attack at dawn.
Jesus weeps on the shoulders
of his heavenly father.
Daniel Kolos
Priceville, Ontario