JE SUIS CHARLIE

by Mary R. Finnegan

Cartoon by Tom Tomorrow at The Daily Kos

I stand outside Notre Dame

quietly, for a moment of silence,

after a lifetime of silence.

Je suis Charlie

I write my rebuke in 140 characters

for the hashtag 

is mightier than the sword.

Je suis Charlie

I unite with all mankind

to strongly condemn

this horrific shooting

or whatever the masses are saying.

Je suis Charlie

I do all these things from over here,

and not too loudly, and only

among friends and infidels 

on the internet and possibly

with the saucy courage of alcohol

in a dark bar 

on a flag draped street somewhere 

in an undisclosed location

because I am only 

looking at blurred cartoons

and pixelated slaughter.

I am only in my pajamas

complaining of the cold

and the price of oil,

keeping my head 

below the parapet.

I am only 

wearing these boots

to wade through

the frigid streets because

Je ne suis pas Charlie.

For when the liar speaks

I do not wish to agree

so I say nothing

Je ne parle pas

when the threat is made

I do not wish to disagree

so I remain silent

Je me tais

for when prayer is called

I do not wish to offend

so I believe nothing

Je ne crois rien

because when the scimitar is raised

above my slender white neck

I do not wish to lose the head

that has done nothing

said nothing

believed nothing.

Non, Je ne suis pas Charlie.

I do not agree 

or disagree.

I do not offend.

I do not blaspheme.

Can you not see

I am on my knees?

Je ne suis pas Charlie.

Je ne suis personne.

Ça va.

Ça va, oui, ça va?

Mary R. Finnegan is an operating room nurse in the Philadelphia area who also writes poetry and short stories.

AFTER HEARING ANOTHER PUBLIC RADIO DISCUSSION IMPLYING THE CARTOONISTS WERE TO BLAME

by Susan Gerardi Bello

Tributes of drawings, flowers, pens and candles are left in front of the Charlie Hebdo offices on January 14, 2015 in Paris, France. (Photo by Aurelien Meunier/Getty Images via New York Observer)

I am walking down the street at night, on my way home from a party,
wearing an above the knee black skirt, and tall black boots.
The rest of me is covered with winter coat, scarf and gloves.
Only my face is showing and the small bit of stocking
from the middle of my knee to the top of my skirt.  I've had wine
but not too much. I am happy, smiling, remembering moments
of conversation, silly asides, laughing 'til my belly hurt.
I reach my car, fish through my bag for my keys, and I am punched
hard, knocked down, dragged away from my car to the back
of the parking lot where it is dark, where the creek runs.
I am hit again and again. I am raped and I am cut. I am discarded,
half-conscious with clumps of frozen leaves.
I am Charlie.


Susan Gerardi Bello is a member of the New York City-based poetry community Brevitas and U.S. 1 Poets' Cooperative in Princeton.  Her poems have appeared in numerous journals including the Paterson Literary Review and U.S. 1 Worksheets as well as on New York Public Radio.  Her poem "The Game" was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. 

ZERO IN THE CEMETERY

by Carolyn Gregory 

Nocturnal Sunrise by Alison Strange-Green

The angels at Pere Lachaise Cemetery
weep this morning,
tears glued frozen to classic features,
wings unable to fly.

They are mourning the dead journalists
who were too saucy with cartoons,
lambasting the prophet
when thousands die under drones
in trenched caverns in Syria.

One man's religion is not
another man's feast to roast and ride
when children and women drop
at weddings and in small cells.

The angels light the graves
of Oscar Wilde and the French Resistance,
stones shining above snow

and then they retreat
to melancholy for this season of violence,
wings bent down with grief.


Carolyn Gregory's poems and essays on music have been published in American Poetry Review, Main Street Rag, Bellowing Ark, Seattle Review, and Stylus. She was featured in For Lovers and Other Losses. She was nominated for a Pushcart Prize for poetry in 2011 and is a past recipient of a Massachusetts Cultural Council award. Her book, Open Letters, was published by Windmill Editions in 2009 and her next, Facing the Music, in 2012. She has been working on a series about the history of guns in America for several years now.

IS PARIS BLEEDING?

by Bill Costley

A million parisiens stand
facing the Tour Eiffel
shutting down quickly
on a massive film noir,

minus tourists,
minus frivolity.
What's amusant about
Charlie Hebdo now ?

Rien. (Nothing) Rien.
Millions of its
next edition will absorb
its dry editorial sang.

Paris is media-sanglant
The world, sympathique.


Bill Costley, among the earliest regular contributors to The New Verse News, served on the Steering Committee of the San Francisco Bay area chapter of the National Writers Union. He lives in Santa Clara, CA.

MARCHONS!

by George Held

   To the indelible spirit of “La Marseillaise”                                                          

Though assassins dealt a death blow                                                                        
To cartoonists at Charlie Hebdo,
Now the free world joins to say “Non!”
To terrorists who trade in woe:
“Vive la satire!” “À bas” the foes
Of liberty, equality, fraternity,
Those magnificent words English
And French and their multicultural
Societies share and now renew
Their commitment to.


George Held, a regular contributor to The New Verse News, has a new book out from Poets Wear Prada, Culling: New & Selected Nature Poems.

CREDO

by Rasma Haidri

“At least 12 were killed in an attack at the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. Four cartoonists are among the dead, including editor and cartoonist Stephane ‘Charb’ Charbonnier, seen here defiantly holding one of the magazine’s covers. The magazine was fire-bombed in 2011 for publishing a cartoon of Muhammad and is know for its provocative satire. The Guardian has live updates here of developing events.” --Ann Telnaes, editorial cartoonist for The Washington Post, 7 January 2015.

I believe in One Art
Father of Cartoon
Begotten of the Pen Almighty
Maker of heaven and earth
I believe in Drawings
Visible and Invisible
Born not made
Being of one Substance
The Ink, the Pen and the Lead
I believe that Art,
Giver of Life, Begotten of man
Came and dwelt among us
Suffered and was buried
So the multitudes would rise
Take up Arms of Pens,
Draw Cartoons a Thousandfold
In world without end.


Rasma Haidri grew up in Tennessee and now lives in the Norwegian arctic where she is a newspaper columnist, textbook writer and teacher. Her poems and essays have been widely published and are forthcoming in Songs for a Passbook Torch, an anthology of poems about Nelson Mandela and Veils, Halos and Shackles, an anthology about violence towards women.