tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4489310405541465454.post4288471234379113597..comments2023-10-11T07:35:31.358-07:00Comments on Knights of Creativity Spirit & Ale: An Angel's Feather...dkWellshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14036130304612683613noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4489310405541465454.post-16668353463338135612010-02-26T08:13:16.482-08:002010-02-26T08:13:16.482-08:00yeah Slams can be incredible.. One of the last t...yeah Slams can be incredible.. One of the last times i was over, we visted friends in Princeton, and there was a slam poetry night going on in a bar we visited. <br><br>A guy called Tim Gellar got up and pounded out an astonishing Slam...and whatever your views on America...I was still struck by its potency. Afterwards i said to him how amazing it was, and would he email a copy so I could show people in the slam community at home, which he did. So hold onto your hats...I give you.... in the next comment box below:<br><br>Why I want to fly the American Flag But can't.<br><br>( Sir d to be contd )Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4489310405541465454.post-16625396524373810052010-02-26T08:17:32.088-08:002010-02-26T08:17:32.088-08:00Why I Want To Fly The U.S. Flag, But Can'tI wa...Why I Want To Fly The U.S. Flag, But Can't<br><br><br>I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br><br>Because it stands for a place that enslaved my African-American brothers and sisters<br><br>and has left them with a legacy of institutionalized racism thicker than jet fuel<br><br>(which I feed every single day).<br><br>Because it represents the cultural genocide and unwritten history of African-<br><br>Americans longer than the missing blackbox tape of every plane that has ever crashed.<br><br>Because it stands for a country whose African-American prison population is nearly the population of Kuwait and who has given them more protection than Rodney King.<br><br>A government whose criminal "justice" system is responsible for more<br>African-Americans having lost their right to vote than civilians who lost their lives at Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined<br>times three.<br><br>Still, I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because it stands for states that try kids as adults<br>But deny them adult rights.<br><br>Nonetheless, I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because it stands for a place that is responsible for the deaths<br>Of more of my Native American brothers and sisters than the<br>Holocaust and the Genocide combined<br>times six.<br><br>Because it symbolizes a country that broke more treaties with them than<br>Floors that fell in both World Trade Centers.<br><br>A government that forced them off their lands<br>Including the one upon which the Pentagon is built<br>Into mobile concentrations camps called reservations.<br><br>Still, I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because it represents a country of institutionalized sexism<br>That denies equal opportunity and power to the sex that gave life<br>To every person who died on September 11 and their loved ones<br>Including me and you.<br><br>And not even the women under the Taliban can make me forget that<br>U.S. women have less power than U.S. men.<br><br>Still, I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because of all my homosexual and bisexual brothers and sisters<br>Who face institutionalized homophobia and<br>Who probably never would have been allowed aboard the F-15 fighter planes<br>Patrolling D.C. skies or onto the ships now in the Persian Gulf.<br><br>Yet I still want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because it represents religious acceptance in a country that<br>Officially celebrates only one religion.<br><br>A land that needs a first lady, a shooting, or an election to put<br>Education on the national agenda.<br><br>I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because of all of my non-white, non-male, non-Christian, and non-heterosexual<br>Brothers and sisters who are excluded from the "liberty and justice for all" part of the flag as the U.S. continues to celebrate a day each year in Columbus' honor.<br><br>Still, I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because of the institutionalized xenophobia and<br>My Mexican brothers and sisters who have died since<br>Clinton's Operation Gatekeeper Program<br>Numbering more than double those who died on Flights 11, 77, 93, and 175.<br><br>Still, I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because it represents a country that walked out of a<br>World Conference on racism-<br><br>A government that invests more in its financial stock<br>Than in the human stock of my disenfranchised Palestinian<br>Brothers and sisters.<br><br>I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because it represents a government that<br>Kills the same number of my<br>Civilian Iraqi brothers and sisters<br>Each month through sanctions as those who<br>Died in New York on September 11,<br>Starving its children for oil over a blood-stained tablecloth of<br>Democracy.<br><br>Karma? Had it comin.'<br>Self-damned by a dam of ignorance<br>So thick it took<br>3,000 + lives to dent it<br>and maybe World War III to defend it-<br>so now then,<br>what do you call it when an assassin accuses an assassin?<br><br> contdAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4489310405541465454.post-50653641659195847702010-02-26T08:19:31.967-08:002010-02-26T08:19:31.967-08:00And such shock streaks the state whenBedouin blaze...And such shock streaks the state when<br>Bedouin blazes set in Kuwait<br>Spread to NYC to DC to every town and city<br>Climbing flagpoles faster than firemen-<br><br>Good Morning, America!<br>And you wake up<br>And you realize<br>And you realize<br>And you realize<br>That a Saudi person is no less than a<br>U.S. person than an<br>Iraqi person than an<br>Afghani person than a<br>Rwandan person than a<br>Serbian person than<br>Any person anywhere -<br>That the human swallows the national cuz<br>Distance is no longer<br>Miles and borders but<br>Heartbeats-<br>That now<br>the political is personal.<br><br>PSST!<br>ask not what your country has<br>Done<br>but what you can do to<br>Others . . .<br><br>I want to fly the U.S. flag, but can't<br>Because it represents a government that will send its children over 3,000 miles away<br>Only a week after over 3,000 of them have died.<br><br>(contd)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4489310405541465454.post-36524528118416905122010-02-26T08:22:18.297-08:002010-02-26T08:22:18.297-08:00I want to fly my flagBut I can no longer pretend I...I want to fly my flag<br>But I can no longer pretend I've been dreaming with my eyes open-<br>I want to fly my-<br>But it doesn't represent the love and support I have for<br>All beings<br>And reminds me of how much I feed what I despise-<br>Because it could stand for a place that is so much more than what it<br>Is -<br>Because it has the power to live up to what it<br>Claims to represent,<br>Not because it has to, but because it<br>Should.<br><br>God bless America?<br>God bless himself can no one else be blessed.<br><br>I want to fly something-<br>I want you to know how I feel just by looking at me<br>But there is no flag for this<br>I cannot raise it when it stands for a<br>lady who has lowered her torch and<br>Spread her legs for<br>oil.<br><br>Yes, America is OPEN FOR BUSINESS -<br>I cannot wave with pride a flag that represents a country where<br>widespread compassion hits only when another<br>earthquake does.<br><br>I cannot fly it<br>Because of the things this country has<br>Done<br>and is<br>Doing<br>to its own people<br>and other peoples<br>Under this flag.<br>Because it doesn't represent what it stands for,<br>What I stand for<br>And even when we, and I mean "we the world," most need to stand together<br>I cannot fly it because I will never forget all that has been done in the name of<br>This flag<br>And I will<br>not<br>perpetuate violence by<br>playing the victim<br>And re-dividing the w/ o/ r/ l/ d,<br>because I can,<br>And forgetting my part-<br>Because it reminds me of everything I do to you everyday<br>To separate us. and to dominate you.<br>because I can.<br><br>I want to fly my flag<br>but can't<br>cuz sometimes the mirror stares deeper than the t.v. glare<br>without hearing that I'm either FOR the enemee or should<br>salute the bloody reflection of my face wherever I go-<br>cuz a well divided against itself cannot pump-<br>cuz all flags lead to me- E Plunocal<br>Unum.<br><br>I want to fly it but I<br>Can't.<br>And though oil may drown these words today<br>I will not let what the flag should stand for<br>Ripple away unspoken on a half mast ~<br><br><br><br>least we all own our hearts ~<br><br>Sir DAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com