Poetry For Peace

I walked in and saw the refreshments staring. ..
Back at me.
Hot apple cider, cold apple cider, molasses cookies, and my favorite…
Banana bread.
The gallery was so clean and crisp. ..
As always.
I saw the chairs, the microphone, and people filtering in. I saw Jess and Candice. …
Phew, Relieved.
Comfort in knowing…
Someone.
Else.
I saw a leader, a director, oh a professor. of what? It didn’t take me long to realize, a professor of language.
Dfhsdufgois mksdfjoseitr ,jsdkfis mskldfjsodf jslkdfulosrf
“No,” I said.
Sdlkfjsd sdfuj iu9itp jsdfki xljs
“No.”
sdlkfusd ksdfksjd sdfjusdf
Finally,
“I have no idea what you are saying.”
She assumed I was one of her, SPANISH students.
“No, I will not be reading in a language I do not know. I am just here to listen and enjoy.”

The Poetry for Peace tonight, was readings of Chile poet, Pablo Neruda. I could have listened for hours even though I had no idea what they were saying. Good thing there was a second reading in English. The poetry in either language was beautiful. Neruda spoke of nature, and had imagery that captivated your senses. BUT, His poems were not meant to be romantic, although they flowed so gracefully off the lips of the speakers to my ears. Pablo Neruda wrote political and social poems. He was an activist. He did not hide. He used art as a form of resistance. He spoke for social justice. He spoke as a character. A professor from SUNY Potsdam, also a poet, and from Chile, read one of the first poems of the night. He said, “The romantic view is that poetry creates a character. Neruda defends those who have no voice.” He becomes the character. He was just a regular guy. He said,
“Come see the blood in the streets.
Come see the blood in the streets.
COME SEE THE BLOOD IN THE STREETS.”
How beautiful is that to you?
I find beauty in the reality. Knowing the context makes it that much more powerful. He was just a regular guy, trying to make good.

I'm Explaining a Few Things

You are going to ask: and where are the lilacs?
and the poppy-petalled metaphysics?
and the rain repeatedly spattering
its words and drilling them full
of apertures and birds?
I'll tell you all the news.

I lived in a suburb,
a suburb of Madrid, with bells,
and clocks, and trees.

From there you could look out
over Castille's dry face:
a leather ocean.
My house was called
the house of flowers, because in every cranny
geraniums burst: it was
a good-looking house
with its dogs and children.
Remember, Raul?
Eh, Rafel? Federico, do you remember
from under the ground
my balconies on which
the light of June drowned flowers in your mouth?
Brother, my brother!
Everything
loud with big voices, the salt of merchandises,
pile-ups of palpitating bread,
the stalls of my suburb of Arguelles with its statue
like a drained inkwell in a swirl of hake:
oil flowed into spoons,
a deep baying
of feet and hands swelled in the streets,
metres, litres, the sharp
measure of life,
stacked-up fish,
the texture of roofs with a cold sun in which
the weather vane falters,
the fine, frenzied ivory of potatoes,
wave on wave of tomatoes rolling down the sea.

And one morning all that was burning,
one morning the bonfires
leapt out of the earth
devouring human beings --
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandits with planes and Moors,
bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,
bandits with black friars spattering blessings
came through the sky to kill children
and the blood of children ran through the streets
without fuss, like children's blood.

Jackals that the jackals would despise,
stones that the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,
vipers that the vipers would abominate!

Face to face with you I have seen the blood
of Spain tower like a tide
to drown you in one wave
of pride and knives!

Treacherous
generals:
see my dead house,
look at broken Spain :
from every house burning metal flows
instead of flowers,
from every socket of Spain
Spain emerges
and from every dead child a rifle with eyes,
and from every crime bullets are born
which will one day find
the bull's eye of your hearts.

And you'll ask: why doesn't his poetry
speak of dreams and leaves
and the great volcanoes of his native land?

Come and see the blood in the streets.
Come and see
The blood in the streets.
Come and see the blood
In the streets!

Pablo Neruda