NEW YEAR'S EVE

by Buff Whitman-Bradley

Image source: Sessions College

Wars bleed
From one year to the next
Greed takes no holiday
Poverty and desperation spread
Like black mold
Across the pages
Of the calendar
I see no reasons to believe
That the coming year
Will be any better
Than the last and
Likely it will be worse
Nevertheless at midnight
I stand outside
In the shivering blackness
And feel myself elated
Once more
By the ancient tableaux
Of winter constellations
Settled into their familiar places
Among the icy stars . . .

No sound no sign
No flash of light
No message from heaven
No harps or bells
But a moment of beauty
On a winter’s night
And an old pessimist’s blind hope
That all will be well


Buff Whitman-Bradley is the author of four books of poetry, b. eagle, poet; The Honey Philosophies; Realpolitik; and When Compasses Grow Old; and the chapbook, Everything Wakes Up! His poetry has appeared in many print and online journals. He is also co-editor, with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley and Sarah Lazare, of the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn Against War.  He has co-produced/directed two documentary films, the award-winning Outside In (with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley) and Por Que Venimos (with the MIRC Film Collective).  He lives in northern California.

THE NEWTOWN MASSACRE

by Buff Whitman-Bradley

Human Giraffe by Subwaysurfer. Image source: Art Jumble Blog

When my children were little
I used to tell them that I was a giraffe
You’re not a giraffe, Daddy!
They would insist
But I stuck to my story
Oh yes I am

When their friends came over
My children would say
Our Daddy says he is a giraffe
But he’s not
The friends would look at me quizzically
And I would say
Oh yes I am

One year I decorated a birthday cake
With a pink and green giraffe
That’s me I said
And although my daughter was growing older
And no longer amused by the same old routine
She indulged me and said
You’re not a giraffe, Daddy
But I could see in her eyes
What she was really thinking –
Whatever
And soon I stopped being a giraffe
Once and for all

I remembered all this today
As I stood silently in the rain
In our little town’s park
With one of my grown daughters
And a score of others grieving the gunning down
Of twenty school children in Connecticut
And I thought about
All the silly-dumb-boring family jokes
Those murdered children will not hear
Over and over and over again
About all the stories that will not be read aloud
About the bikes and games and snazzy sneakers
That won’t get bought for birthdays
About the pet names and nicknames
That will go unused
Missy, Natty, Buddy Boy, Baby Cakes
Mikey, Skeeter, Nan

I believe I chose to be a giraffe
Because it seems such an odd and improbable creature
Something Evolution doodled on a notepad
During a long dull meeting
A goofy-looking non-threatening beast
That doesn’t scare little ones
A gentle quiet Mister Rogers kind of animal
With a body as big as a house
Where a child could take shelter during a storm
And be safe

It is morning in the Serengeti
Clear skies 60-plus degrees and climbing
And while giraffes are waking up to another day
Of browsing in the treetops
And caring for their young
A long cold dark night begins
In Newtown, Connecticut
And in the wintery, violence-wracked heart of America


Buff Whitman-Bradley is the author of four books of poetry, b. eagle, poet; The Honey Philosophies; Realpolitik; and When Compasses Grow Old; and the chapbook, Everything Wakes Up! His poetry has appeared in many print and online journals. He is also co-editor, with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley and Sarah Lazare, of the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn Against War. He has co-produced/directed two documentary films, the award-winning Outside In (with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley) and Por Que Venimos (with the MIRC Film Collective). He lives in northern California.

INVASION OF GAZA 2012

by Buff Whitman-Bradley

Image source: Occupy Wall Street

Inside the heart of the invader
There is a cave where the corpses are stored
A cave of ice that keeps the bodies
From decomposing and putrefying
So the invader needn’t suffer the stink
Deep cold freezes the last expressions of terror
On children’s faces
Freezes the arms of dead parents
Around their slaughtered infants

The frozen bodies are neatly stacked
In the lightless cavern inside the invader’s heart
To make the most efficient use of space
So there will always be room for more
Because the bodies keep coming and coming
And they must be put away somewhere
The grandfather mowed down
In his olive grove
The teen picked off trying to get home to family
The pregnant mother crushed
By her collapsing roof
The toddler burnt to a crisp
By white phosphorous

Inside the heart of the occupier
Are bleak frigid factories that turn the murdered
Into building materials
For constructing homes on stolen land
With lovely gardens and swimming pools
Inside the heart of the occupier
Are bitterly cold prisons
Of torture and indefinite detention
For those who resist
The relentless encroachments
Of the mad blind machine

Inside the heart of the nation
In a cave of black ice
The explosive voice of self-righteous hypocrisy
Booms and echoes off the walls
We are defending ourselves
We are the upright and the good
We are the chosen and
All we do is the will of God

But there are other voices as well
Inside the heart of the nation
And inside the heart of the world
The small voices of grasses in green pastures
The healing voices of warm rain and still waters
The steadfast valiant voices of those
Who refuse to cooperate with bulldozer politicians
With marauding colonists
With tormentors of the rightful inhabitants
Voices nearly impossible to hear
In the roar of war and propaganda
But necessary to hear and to heed
If true justice is to roll down like waters
And true righteousness like a mighty stream


Buff Whitman-Bradley is the author of four books of poetry, b. eagle, poet; The Honey Philosophies; Realpolitik; and When Compasses Grow Old; and the chapbook, Everything Wakes Up! His poetry has appeared in many print and online journals. He is also co-editor, with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley and Sarah Lazare, of the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn Against War. He has co-produced/directed two documentary films, the award-winning Outside In (with Cynthia Whitman-Bradley) and Por Que Venimos (with the MIRC Film Collective). He lives in northern California.