Do you think it fair to say I may care
When I care enough to say: “I do not care.”
I think it depends on how I may say it,
With distance in tone or rebellious gait,
An arching of eyebrows, a smile forged in hell,
Or the weight of the world in the sighs I expel.
I hereby do gather the silence you spare
Is loud confirmation that you do not care.
Ode On Short Rib Ragù
Note to Ode Enthusiasts: This is a ten line stanza in iambic pentameter following the scheme ABAB and a Miltonian sestet CDEDCE. Styled after the first stanza of Keats’ Ode On A Grecian Urn, and guaranteed to fall short.
Warning: Elizabethan tone ahead
What magic doth transpire 'tween mind and pot That warmly welcometh what once formed cage, But now is seasoned, salted, shredded, brought To tenderness thy hand hath come to gauge. I sense the bay leaf draping sprigs of thyme, Its fragrance courting parsley laying soft Upon a bed of blushing carrots and Rosemary aromatic, wont to waft Toward my sense olfactory till I’m Impassioned forth to rise and kiss thine hand.
Punishing Clockmakers, And Other American Pastimes
We’re hurting bad, America,
You know we’re hurting bad
When a schoolboy brings a project in
That sends us kicking mad.
He just made a clock, this thing that tells
The time with gears and wires,
But we see the clocks that brown hands forge
As objects starting fires.
Doesn’t matter what you learn in school,
Let me tell you what makes dumb:
Is when prejudice and fear
Fashion every rule of thumb.
You say guns don’t kill, people do,
Yet a schoolboy’s doing time.
Need a license now to make a clock?
Now, learning is a crime.
If we really don’t like bullies
And the weapons that they draw,
We can’t let bullies run our schools
Nor let them press the law.
Broken
What can I say! What can I do!
How can I deserve to stand before you!
I am like my raiment, divided in two:
One that I know, the other knows You.
But I don’t know the other.
All of the dirt that covers my heart
Is on my skin now, I’m falling apart,
I smell of the foulness I’ve wrought with my hand,
I’m broken so fine, I’m one with the sand.
But I long to find the other me,
I’m blind although I can see,
And the words that I write that I may be free
Make me slave to my each fantasy.
Take me now and let me be free.
Help me now that I may find me.
My Palace Isn’t Big Enough
A sonnet deploring the apathy and inaction of wealthy neighbors letting hapless refugees seek out asylum far away from home. The use of first person here points to government rather than citizen.
My palace isn’t big enough for you
And me, so I suggest you take a ride
Just down the street to where a pot of stew
May see a face that has no place to hide.
My gross insensitivity may seem
Disgusting to the world, but how can one
By any measure realize his dream
With mendicancy blocking out the sun.
I need my oil to generate me power,
And power runs the air conditioning:
You know we need it hour after hour
To cool the passions all this wealth can bring.
So let me breathe and be now on your way,
My gold will weigh me down another day.
Self-righteously Unhypocritical
“That’s just how I feel, Mom. I can’t lie, I’m not a hypocrite.”
It was a very matter-of-fact statement, made in Aisle 5 at the grocery store somewhere between the baked beans and tomato paste. The speaker was a girl, probably thirteen, maybe fourteen years of age. Her mother instantly disconnected from her mentally, and the girl reciprocated. As they ambled down the aisle filling their cart, I could sense they were in their separate worlds. And pretty soon, I was in mine.
As a father of four, I fully expect to suffer that sort of rejoinder in the coming years. But what got me writing this article was the confidence and self-assurance with which we, adults and children alike, see ourselves above being hypocrites. We are quite vocal about not being hypocrites, are we not?
At first blush, that seems quite honorable. In fact, let me be clear. That is honorable. No one should want to be a hypocrite. Nothing good about being hypocritical. Hypocrisy is a universally despicable attribute, best not to have applied to yourself. But we know the world has its share of hypocrites. The trouble is we also seem to know we’re never among them.
So, okay…what on earth am I trying to say here?
Let’s look back a thousand years in time, at giants of men and women, people of substance, their bodies and souls flushed with a maturity that saw them shoulder responsibility the likes of which very few adults in today’s world can even relate to. I will consider only one example.
Umar. May God be pleased with him.
Umar the son of Al-Khattab was the second of the four rightly guided Caliphs, succeeding Abu Bakr. Let’s go back to a time before either of their Caliphates.
There was a time in Medina when the Messenger of God (God send His prayers upon him, and His blessings and peace) once enjoined upon a trusted companion, a man by the name of Hudhayfah, the confidential task of mentally recording a list of a dozen or so names of men who the prophet himself had categorized as hypocrites. These men were not to be called out or exposed on account of this knowledge, and Hudhayfah (God be pleased with him) was only to carry with him the knowledge of their names. The prophet had asked him not to disclose the names on that list to anyone. The men comprising the list were to be afforded the status of Muslims.
When Umar learned of Hudhayfah’s knowledge, he approached him and adjured him by God to inform him if he himself was among those named. Hudhayfah was torn between his calling to keep the list confidential and Umar’s unrelenting insistence. He finally informed Umar that he was not of the hypocrites, and then pressed Umar not to ask him again.
That’s right. Umar wanted to know if he was among the hypocrites.
Umar, of whom the Messenger (God be pleased with him) is reported to have said: When Umar walks down a path, the devil chooses to walk down a different path.
Umar, of whom the Messenger is reported to have said: If there were to be a prophet after me, it would be Umar.
And Umar was concerned that he may be counted among a dozen hypocrites, that too of the worst order of hypocrisy imaginable.
You know what really made Umar (God be pleased with him) NOT a hypocrite? I think it had much to do with the fact that he did not see himself immune to it. It does not take a genius to know the nature of hypocrisy. It is a subtle beast that creeps up on you. It finds you justifying your thinking and actions fully and logically (and scientifically, even). It is a little bit like madness in that the mad one is sure of his sanity, not doubting it for one moment. It is quite unlike madness in that hypocrisy must be satisfied and indulged for it to grow, and satisfy you back.
I am not saying that everyone who says they are not a hypocrite must be one. No. God forbid. All I am saying is that rather than thinking of ourselves as immune to it, we may be better off following the example of Umar and checking in on ourselves from time to time, entertaining the possibility that we just may be acting hypocritical. Entertaining that possibility may well be the weakest form of inoculation to protect against that disease of the heart.
I once heard Shaykh Amin Kholwadia say these words, and he is often heard repeating the idea many different ways:
As soon as you feel good about yourself, know that the devil has got you, because he is made from fire and he understands the nafs better than you.
That.
I wrote this some years ago, seems vaguely relevant.
Clear As Fog
Order. It pervades all things, inextricably linking what we sense in this world with what we cannot beyond it. It’s everywhere.
The stars above, and the galaxies of souls below.
The tongue, and the eternal Garden it tends to.
The soft bloom of a rose welcoming sun, and a prayer answered.
The silent obeisance of the trees, and the circumambulation of the planets.
I imagine the marauding armies of men portending hosts of avenging angels joined in ranks, faithfully holding back for an appointed time.
I suppose then that one may hope to divine the next move of a man by looking to what his child has done.
But then I also expect rain at my every act of heedlessness. It seldom falls.
In Sonnet
Each thing that meets the eye is but a sign
Of something that lives on beyond this earth;
Our souls reflect celestial design,
And cool remembrance brings a Garden’s birth;
The answer to a prayer like the sun
That bathes the petals of a blooming rose;
The silent bowing of the trees as one
To match the manner every planet goes.
I wonder if the blood that armies spill
Portends a host of angels foming ranks
Awaiting the allowance of their will
To carry out the justice it demands.
I often think my sins will bring the rain,
But all that falls are hopes that rise again.
Walking
I can walk all I want,
I can go any place,
With my heart in my hand, and my feet on the road
And the sun in my face.
I can sing all I want
To the tune of my soul,
I can reach very high, grab a handful of sky
And decide I am whole.
But each shadow’s a sign
To an eye that can see
Through the fog of the sin that it finds itself in,
Yes, I’m talking ’bout me.
And the laughter like wine
Makes the colors all dance
Till you turn your eyes down, as you look to the ground
At a shadow of chance.
Now I’m seeking a place
Past the reaches of space
Where no shadow is born, and a soul that is torn
May be mended by grace.
Now My Heart Is An Ocean
There runs a stream from every limb A river from each organ And every single one that flows From the top of my head To the tips of my toes Yes, each one drains my plains and goes Down into the seas of my heart And there it splashes 'gainst the cliffs Of my transgression Mixing in With the salt of my sin Now my heart is an ocean And my journey may begin But where does an ocean go? It goes to my eyes And streams down my face As I fall to my knees in utter disgrace Till the winds of forgiveness Blow on its waves Of hope for this lowly Hapless of slaves Yes, there's hope in these tears To put out the flames Of a fire that taunts me By all of my names Let them flow till the seas Of my heart become calm Till my face feels the kiss Of eternal Salaam
Bartering Our Souls For “Peace” – Srebenica Twenty Years On
As we mark twenty years since the brutal killings in a Bosnian town of over 8,000 Muslim boys and men ranging from ages 12 to 77, we are faced with emerging evidence bringing into focus the unfortunate role of the free world in the commission of what has been called the “worst massacre on European soil since the Third Reich”. Details around how a safe area came to be presented to the Serb death-squads are chilling, no doubt.
 |
| Photo courtesy guardian.co.uk: man praying at the gravesites of Srebenica |
But there is something even more disturbing than the actual genocide itself. This was clearly not the first time an act of ethnic cleansing had shocked the world. If we restrict ourselves to a simple game of numbers, the killing of 8,000 boys and men is a drop in the ocean of genocide that the twentieth century alone has seen. (Wikipedia List of genocides by death toll.) No, the numbers are not interesting. But the politics is.
It is one thing that the Serbian killing machine had overrun Srebenica, and the likes of Mladic had personally overseen the separation of boys as young as twelve and their fathers and grandfathers from their mothers, sisters, daughters and wives. While the women and girls were sent off to “Muslim territory”, a collective term for the horrors that awaited them as they were delivered to their new homes, the boys and their fathers and their grandfathers were transported to the lush fields around the town and cut down by soldiers, men who were beginning to reel under the fatigue of playing executioners.
Killing is hard work, even with guns. To send metal flying at over twice the speed of sound, tearing open the chests and heads of twelve and thirteen year-old boys can take a toll on the sickest of hearts.So, yes, that is all one thing.
But it is another thing for a massacre on a scale of this magnitude to not just occur, but flourish on the watch of a group that was instituted for the very purpose of preventing such oppression, an institution called the United Nations that is held as the positive culmination of the great lessons learned from World War II. Sure, there were hostages – 30 soldiers of a Dutch contingent – whose lives were threatened if Srebenica wasn’t handed over quietly. But now we read of this:
According to declassified US cables details of the killings reached western intelligence and decision makers soon after they began on 13 July; CIA operatives watched almost “live” at a satellite post in Vienna. From that day, spy planes caught what was happening. “Standing men held by armed guard. Later pictures show them lying in the fields, dead,” according to one cable.
A senior state department official insists: “All US partners were immediately informed.” Yet the slaughter was allowed to run its course, no attempt made to deter the killers, or to locate the men and boys, let alone rescue them.
The next day, 14 July, the UN security council said it feared “grave mistreatment and killing of innocent civilians”; it said it had received “reports that 4,000 men and boys have gone missing”. But the diplomats continued business as usual.
…
…
Pauline Neville-Jones, then political director at the British Foreign Office, argued as late as 2009: “It still remains to be established whether the Serbs had a long-range intention to do just that [massacre men and boys]. Serb forces engaged in an ethnic cleansing campaign to rid Srebrenica of its Muslims [which] eventually became genocide when the decision was made to separate men targeted for extinction.”
Jean-Claude Mallet, the director of strategy at the French defence ministry, says in an interview: “I had no illusion that atrocities would be committed. We had reported that. But never such as the ones that occurred.”
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia rejects these views, ruling that the killings were premeditated well in advance. In the conviction of the Bosnian Serb general Radislav Krstic for aiding and abetting genocide at Srebrenica, the court ruled: “Without detailed planning, it would have been impossible to kill so many people in such a systematic manner in such a short time, between 13 July and 17 July.”
The International Court of Justice would rule in 2007: “It must have been clear that there was a serious risk of genocide in Srebrenica.”
France’s foreign minister at the time, Alain Juppé, says in an interview: “We all knew the men would be annihilated, or at least that the Serbs were not sparing the lives of prisoners”.
Source: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/04/how-britain-and-us-abandoned-srebrenica-massacre-1995
And this:
But a new investigation of the mass of evidence documenting the siege suggests much wider involvement in the events leading to the fall of Srebrenica. Declassified cables, exclusive interviews and testimony to the tribunal show that the British, American and French governments accepted – and sometimes argued – that Srebrenica and two other UN-protected safe areas were “untenable” long before Mladic took the town, and were ready to cede Srebrenica to the Serbs in pursuit of a map acceptable to the Serbian president, Slobodan Miloševic, for peace at any price.
But as they considered granting Srebrenica to the Serbs, western powers were also aware, or should have been, of the Bosnian Serb military “Directive 7” ordering the “permanent removal” of Bosnian Muslims from the safe areas. They also knew Mladic had told the Bosnian Serb assembly, “My concern is to have them vanish completely”, and that Karadžic pledged “blood up to the knees” if his army took Srebrenica.
Robert Frasure, a US diplomat working as an international representative, reported to Washington that Miloševic would not accept a peace map unless the safe areas were ceded to the Serbs. His boss, Anthony Lake, the US national security adviser, favoured a revised map that ceded Srebrenica, and the US policy-making Principals Committee urged that UN troops “pull back from vulnerable positions” – ergo, the safe areas.
France and Britain agreed, with UK defence secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind arguing that the safe areas were “untenable”, as defended in 1995. As Mladic’s troops advanced on Srebrenica, the west failed to heed warnings of the town’s imminent fall. Once it had, says General Van der Wind of the Dutch defence ministry, in an exclusive interview with the Observer, the UN provided 30,000 litres of petrol, used by the Serbs to drive their quarry to the killing fields and plough their bodies into mass graves.
As the killing hit full throttle, top western negotiators met Mladic and Miloševic but did not raise the issue of mass murder, even though unclassified US cables show that the CIA was watching the killing fields almost “live” from satellite planes.
The shocking findings of high-level willingness in London, Washington and Paris to cede Srebrenica were collated over 15 years by Florence Hartmann, a former Le Monde correspondent, for a book, The Srebrenica Affair: The Blood of Realpolitik. Hartmann worked as a spokeswoman for the prosecutor at the international criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia between 2000 and 2006.
Source: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/04/west-true-role-in-srebrenica-massacre-bosnia
I can’t speak for the British and French roles in all of this. But as an American, my respect for the law of this land, and my faith in its immense potential for goodness, empower me to hold my government to a level of accountability commensurate with its unique position in the world. When words of grief are spoken in Srebenica next weekend, it would be an obscenity at the very least for America to not acknowledge its inaction to attempt (not succeed, but just attempt) to use the intelligence and certain knowledge it had to stop that tragic massacre.
We all tear up when Peter Parker hears the words of his late uncle echo in his mind. “With great power, comes great responsibility.” It is time we own up to the values we espouse, to end the hypocrisy and take ownership of our failings. We must not be wary to go on record and acknowledge such failure. That would be cowardice and against everything we believe in. Rather what we must be wary of are the long term consequences of a silence that makes no sense in a nation that prides itself upon making some noise. It is a silence that will surely undermine and mock our current and future efforts to navigate the bloody oceans of world peace. Let’s show some backbone. Let’s be the proverbial grownup in a house full of children, and stand for the justice we are committed to as a nation.
The souls of the boys and men that perished in the violence of Srebenica twenty years ago may well be alive and at peace. What should keep us awake at night is whether we who are left behind, in our drunken pursuit of a perception of peace at any cost, have lost our souls.