Crawling back and the Ukraine

Well.....
Posting every Friday lasted about as long as I expected it to.... not very long. School got real, training increased and writing sadly is often the first thing to go. I was also bummed about breaking my every Friday promise (even if it was only a promise with myself). But I am back, and with a new shame-free promise, to post as often as life allows.

 To Kiev....

Freedom Square-Kiev
or
"Freedom Square"

I want to post a poem that is not as urgent now, but none-the-less I believe very important still. I watched closely the violent protest that rocked Ukraine over a month ago. I was heart broken as I watched video's of people protesting for their freedom being dragged out of the Square riddled with bullet wounds. Hotel lobbies lines with bodies of dead protesters. As I scrolled through news stories it also became apparent to me, that not all that the "freedom fighters" claimed was true. They claimed peaceful protest, yet nearly every news clip shows men firing make-shift shotguns and throwing Molotov cocktails toward the soldiers. It was violent all around. And it broke my heart. So I wrote a poem.

A video that went viral and I have thought a lot about. Yes fighting for freedom, but by what means, Ukrainian Angel Headed Hipster?

I read this poem out-loud at a poetry event. As I read I had the image of Freedom Square seen above projected on the screen behind me. About a third of the way through the poem I turned and began directly speaking to the image, with my back to the audience. It was extremely freeing and cathartic. There is not much I can do about the freedom of Ukraine, but say what I feel must be said. And this is what I feel must be said.

I was reading some Pablo Neruda at the time and the poem is heavily influenced by some of his poems on a similar protest in Chile. The italicized lines are directly from his poem, "The Dead in the Square".

The Dead in The (Freedom) Square

-Reflections on Pablo Neruda’s The Dead in the Square

This crime took place right in the open Square.

Not in the forest was the innocent blood spilled,

not in the thirsty concealing and sand of the pampas.

No one made any attempt to cover it up.

This crime was done in the very heart of the country.

I do Not come to weep here where they fell.

I do not come wearing the war relics of our

grand-fathers, tin hats and car-door shields.

You have been screaming in the square so long—

you have forgotten your voice.

I have come to speak.

I have not come with a Molotov Cocktail,

I have come with a voice. Kiev:

Tune your ears to my voice.

To those dragging bodies out of the Square

I have come to speak—

To those dragging bodies into the Square

I have come to speak.

You have burned Freedom Square—

the angelic topped hallmark of your nation,

chard black—

            grieving Square

                        grieving Kiev.

With your hands you have torn

down the monuments

of your Oppressors but your hands

would tear down heaven if only they could grasp.

But you cannot grasp—

only shout.

You shout out in the world’s newspapers:

Look at the President he fired LIVE

ammunition.

Your twenty-five year prophet says:

            We want to be free.

I want to live a moral life

            We want to be free

Build this freedom in our country

            We want to be free

It is the gift of a free Kiev—

We fight for the gift of a free Kiev

But you have forgotten the blood

that gushed forth in the middle of the street

right in front of the palace,

your red stains remain there

like stars, fixed and implacable.

The blood that built the square you burned.

A Kiev freed with a bread-basket

of Molotov Cocktail’s  and

improvised munitions is a

dead Kiev.

I speak to the old generation:

In the name of those dead—

I demand punishment.

You have given them life but on

the rim of hell. They feed on roots,

while yachts sit moored outside

your courts. Your ceilings reach toward

the heavens, but surly you are not above

the angel that crowns the Square.

You sent the men with loaded rifles—

with orders to kill without mercy,

then you ran from the blood that

ebbs to your feet—

I demand punishment.

Kiev tune your ears to this voice.

O fallen brothers, out of the silence

your voices will rise in the mighty shouts of freedom

when the hope of the people flames into paeans of Joy.