GEORGIANS ON MY MIND

by Jacqueline Coleman-Fried

George Balanchine with, Mourka, his cat. Photo by Martha Swope (1964). NYPL Digital Collections, Image ID: 5120841

Police behind riot shields beat protesters facing Europe,

robed in Georgian flags, calling for new elections.

 

     Sometimes Russia moves with planes and tanks.    

     Sometimes it strangles slowly, so no one notices.

 

Cat floats around my home like a ballet dancer

waving her curved plume tail, padding on velvet paws.perfume, 

 

     Sinking on velvet paws, she pliés

     before jumping, leaping.

 

Choreographer Balanchine used to throw his cat

in the air and photograph her on the way down.

 

     Threw his cat in the air to watch her gymnastic grace.

     Taught his dancers to move like that.

 

Taught them, too, the perfume of Russian ballet.

Though his real name, Balanchivadze, was Georgian.

 

 

Jacqueline Coleman-Fried is a poet who lives in Tuckahoe, NY. Her work has appeared in The New Verse News, Nixes Mate Review, Streelight Magazine, Witcraft, and The Orchard Poetry Journal.

NEXT GEN JEWS

by Rob Okun

A new Jewish tradition is growing in those places where solidarity flourishes. Amid the ugliness and death, and as our institutions cleave to the mistaken idea that our safety comes from ever more brutal applications of state power, the future of our people is being written on campuses and in the streets. Thousands of Jews of all ages are creating something better than what we inherited. Our new Jewish tradition prioritizes truth-telling and justice, and in this way it is actually the old Jewish tradition, which has given us all the tools we’re using. —William Alden, The Nation, May 10, 2024. Photo: Jews calling for a cease-fire in Gaza demonstrate at Grand Central Station in New York City on October 27, 2023. (Kena Betancur / AFP via Getty Images)

now comes a multigenerational exodus:

next gen jews leading us out of the

desert of fear where
too many in our ancient tribe
—hearts paralyzed by trauma—still 

cannot see 
the nakba as a catastrophe for
our semitic cousins

stifling next gen voices only strengthens resolve
shutting down encampments is a 
losing proposition:
love flourishes in these life camps and
 “justice, justice, thou shalt pursue” 
remains our north star
of david

with an outstretched hand 
fingers tightly wrap around 
the braided fringes hanging at
the ends of our meditation shawls
we hear the cries of our far flung 
family in diaspora

turning inward—to the work of tikkun olam: 
there is a jewish renewal unfolding
a new jewish agenda being birthed 
at street seders and shabbats 
in the rain 

no one, not netennotajew nor any jew—no 

matter how hard they squeeze their eyes 

wide shut—
can unsee the future 
blowing in the wind on campuses 
in the streets and in the hearts of all 
those following next gen jews out of egypt

Rob Okun is editor emeritus of Voice Male, a magazine which has been chronicling the profeminist men's movement since the mid-1980s. His commentaries and op-eds are syndicated by the Portland, Oregon-based Peace Voice. 

ALMA MATER

by Catherine Gonick

Pro-Palestinian protesters gather in front of Sproul Hall during a planned protest at UC Berkeley in Berkeley, Calif., on Monday, April 22, 2024. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)

A goddess of silence carries

my severed right arm

 

my Zionist  

arm they call 

 

genocidal among

many other names.

Silently moving

out of sight

through camps

where the righteous

sing from tents 

it waves goodbye.

   

I hear

the blood of words dry

feel the pain

of my phantom limb. 

Catherine Gonick's alma mater is U.C. Berkeley. She has published poetry in journals including Live Encounters, Notre Dame Review, Forge, and Beltway Poetry Quarterly, and in anthologies including Support Ukraine, Grabbed, and Rumors, Secrets & Lies: Poems About Pregnancy, Abortion and Choice. She works in a company that slows the rate of global warming through projects that repair and restore the climate. 

A LOOK BACK FROM AGING

by Tricia Knoll

I wore a peace symbol bandana on my arm

when I received a professional degree 

from the Yale graduate school in 1970. 

I marched with candles in California,

put my butt down in an administrator’s office

at Stanford. I did not know then the extent

of my privilege. 

 

We walked. We assembled, chanted

simple words to a drumbeat. We saw

villages destroyed, lives ripped from

ancestral homes. Some of our parents

agreed with what we were doing, but

not all. Not mine. Despite the deaths,

the endlessness of destruction,

hopelessness, despair. 

 

I began to teach high school and met 

refugees. The first to arrive spoke

French, English and Vietnamese. 

A teen described the airlift from the embassy.

How he left his white dog behind. Later

I met Hmong and Mien whose lives

started harder.  

 

I cannot assume that to be pro-Palestinian

is to be an anti-Semite. I’m old enough

to know that flinging slurs gets us nowhere. 

I cry over young children starving to death

in Gaza, mothers giving birth in rubble. 

The clashing words of our leaders seem weak.

Money speaks, what must say do not kill

any more innocents. Insist money be spent

for humans wrapped inside carnage to live, 

eat, shelter, sleep, learn, grow. Open

the walls to food, good food.  

 

Arresting the protesting young enflames.

Horses, soldiers in camo, zip ties. Gaza

is filled with tent cities. Torn tents. 

 

I live in Vermont. My electeds oppose spending

more money for lethal weapons for Israel.

I thank them. When we hear support for Israel

is ironclad—that must not mean only bombs

and guns, the weapons of metal. Our mettle

must stand for the children, the men and women

who have nowhere to go, yet hear threats

that more and worse is yet to come.

Tricia Knoll, an aging Vermont poet, understands what drives campus protests. Her poetry collections often focus on eco-poetry (One Bent Twig) or personal responses to feminism and privilege (How I Learned to be White and The Unknown Daughter).

AMERICAN SENRYU: FRAMED DIPLOMAS ON THE WALL

by William Aarnes

Despite PhDs,

administrators will fail

the test of protest.

William Aarnes lives in Manhattan.

QUESTIONS WE ASK OURSELVES

by Rachel R. Baum

A Moorpark College professor was charged Thursday with involuntary manslaughter and battery in the death of a Jewish protester who authorities said died after a confrontation with pro-Palestinian demonstrators at a rally in Thousand Oaks, CA.

 

Questions we asked ourselves 
   in 1930s Germany and in 2020s America:

Should we remove the mezuzahs from our doors? 
oh but you can see the shadow, the shape
the ghost mezuzah, clear as any sign. any target
 
Should we take off our Star of David necklaces? 
Christians’ crosses gleam from their throats
our naked tender throats invite, incite violence
 
Should we avoid attending demonstrations?
where angry people meet to blame 
Zionists or Jews, no difference to them
 
Should we hide our opinions, our politics?
even safe rooms we know are not safe
no matter, speak out or stay quiet, we die anyway.

 
Rachel R. Baum, a Best of the Net nominated poet, has tried unsuccessfully to avoid writing poems about current events. She lives in upstate New York with her dog Tennyson.

SPEAKING, UNSPEAKING

by Lavinia Kumar

A “McCarthyite Backlash” Against Pro-Palestine Speech: From university disciplinary hearings to death threats, supporters of Palestinian rights are facing a wave of reprisals. —Jewish Currents, October 20, 2023. Rick Friedman / Alamy Stock Photo: Students rally for Palestine at Harvard University on October 14th, 2023.

First, Fourteenth, speech freedom laws—a speaker’s 

Right to let words fly like leaves from trees, and now new

Edited 19^th century pro- anti- Protestant, Catholic is back

Excoriating religions, their people, morphed to

 

Swarms of crowds, anti- pro- Palestine, Israel, a revived 

Partisan diatribe, a pugnacious polemic

Energized by freedom of speech, guns, flags, politicians

Elected to lance wise trees, plant dissent, grow weeds of disquiet,  

Champion division and decomposition—while vultures

Hover over words, freedoms, human rights, and

 

Instantly Wall Street funders plunge down to scarf

Numerous dollars, from universities, they gave, yes,

 

Donated, but today want to scavenge back, yes

Adamantly against “free” speech they don’t approve…

Names spattered, posted, across media, a strings-attached

Generosity, employment conditional on proscribed screed 

Engineered, implanted, into young minds, those abundant in

Rallies on world streets, for freedom. For truly free speech. 

Lavinia Kumar’s recent poems appear (or will soon) in Poets Choice, Kelsey Review, Schuylkill Valley Journal, MacQueen’s Quinterly, New Jersey Journal of Poetry, Tiny Seed.

A COLLAGE OF HANGINGS

by Lisa St. John

Iran executed a second prisoner on Monday convicted over crimes committed during the nationwide protests challenging the country’s theocracy, publicly hanging him from a construction crane as a gruesome warning to others.  The execution of Majidreza Rahnavard came less than a month after he allegedly fatally stabbed two members of a paramilitary force after purportedly becoming angry about security forces killing protesters. The development underscores the speed at which Iran now carries out death sentences handed down for those detained in the demonstrations that the government hopes to put down. Activists warn that at least a dozen people already have been sentenced to death in closed-door hearings. At least 488 people have been killed since the demonstrations began in mid-September, according to Human Rights Activists in Iran, a group that’s been monitoring the protests. Another 18,200 people have been detained by authorities. Iran’s Mizan news agency, which falls under the country’s judiciary, published a collage of images of Rahnavard hanging from the crane, his hands and feet bound, a black bag over his head. AP, December 13, 2022

His hands and feet bound,

a black bag over his head.

 

Majidreza Rahnavard, we won’t remember

your name. But your death will add

to the gruesome pictures of memory.

 

He had been convicted on the charge of 

“moharebeh,” of waging war against god.

 

Evidently, god can’t take care of himself,

fight his own battles, or defend his

own honor. 

 

Typically, those condemned are alive

as the crane lifts them off their feet

 

What lesson would be learned otherwise? 

Those left “on the wall” of The Handmaid’s Tale

also had their heads bagged. 

Just fiction.

 

“But the third rope was still moving: the child, too light, 

was still breathing...” Night by Elie Wiesel 

Just history.

 

Just a girl who wouldn’t wear a scarf,

no pubic hanging, killed in custody

mysteriously. 

 

At least 488 people have been killed since

the demonstrations began… another 18,200

people have been detained.

 

Just news.

Lisa St. John is a writer living in upstate New York. Her chapbook Ponderings is available on her website. Her first full-length book of poetry Swallowing Stones is forthcoming from Kelsay Day Books. Lisa has published her poetry in journals such as The Poet’s Billow, Light, Entropy Magazine, The Poetry Distillery, Poets Reading the News, and Chronogram Magazine. Lisa’s nonfiction work has been published in Grief Digest and Sleet Magazine.

REVIVAL

by Spatika

People protest against the Citizenship Amendment Bill—which allows Hindus from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan to get citizenship and exclude Muslims from the same countries—in New Delhi on December 7, 2019. Javed Sultan/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images via Vox, December 16, 2019

Are America’s Blacks and India’s Muslims politically comparable? This question has acquired a new salience with the rise of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, underway for weeks in the US, covering several hundred cities. Comparisons have been drawn with the anti-CAA protests in India, lasting three months after mid-December, rebelling against the attempted demotion of India’s Muslims to secondary citizenship. The mainstream Black argument that Blacks have been treated as inferior Americans, with Whites as the putative owners of the nation, is not altogether distinct. —The Indian Express, July 6, 2020

After a gap of 5 months, anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protests were once again back on the streets of Dibrugarh with hundreds of activists of the All Assam Students’ Union (Aasu) taking out a motorcycle rally. —The Times of India, August 4, 2020

I have loved Julius Caesar in stories
from my English friends.
I have despised Julius Caesar in words,
striking upon ages.
I live today in burning home astray, my mother
carries small paper notes in tattered folded hands,
saree sifts light through, the only windows left.
the men in uniform are
almost here, asking for signed papers.
I have none. I wish
they did not have pilots fly overhead in our screams, I wish
the skies did not rain upon our chalk graffiti, because
paint was for rich. I wish
our written word wasn’t flung behind bars
nobody to see, I wish
this had never begun.
Caesar lived through citizen’s strangled breaths.
but today I can hear him say,

“My countrymen never cried,
  for my death. Pilgrims, ragged urchins,
  rum-cupped lips did not bawl from inns,
  ivory clad nobles’ eyelids batted away at dry air,
  but even in those sleeping beneath crumbling columns,
  clothes carried not a
  single tear. there was
  no force, no sheer strength of circus led gladiator,
  no power of cavalier battalion, that brought
  forth water of the bodies that my countrymen wore.
  until
  someone spoke
  Antony, my noble aide, Antony
  the moonlight to remember when my rays
  no longer served people their warmth
  Molten silver, seeping shades of wrong
  and glory mingled in lava beds,
  thorn showers, Antony’s words,
  bitter water came streaming forth,
  chiseled edges, Antony’s words,
  cracks to a country’s soft minds,
  breaking
  stealthily through brittle floodgate woes.”

And thousands of years later, come such
  a time of dark pits laden with the bodies of
            my robed brethren.
  a time of words printed in white against white pages
            the children born with sight never see.
  a time of petty gains made from my father’s caps
            pieces of marble tablet remain, which is mosque, which is tomb?
  a time when nobody can say.
today is here because yesterday was deaf to the pleas
of a thousand years.
are Antonys only built for dictators?
today is here, because the day I had a home, those on
the other side would walk confidently past it.
for when I still found chalk to write,
the only hands that rose was to cover people's eyes.
and now
masks are here to silence us.
a viral emergency is the cloak everyone wears around me,
I was born here and I am to leave,
can tears of rage be washed with bottles of hand sanitizer?
I didn’t need arms to fight,
I needed you, I needed her, I needed many.

Spatika is a fourth year student at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Mohali, pursuing an Integrated Master's in biology. She is an INSPIRE Fellowship recipient, interested in neurobiology and writing. She is also a contributor at Feminism in India, and Delhi Poetry Slam, and a senior editor of her institute magazine.

C0LDER (S0NNET 0) AND C0LDER, BERKELEY

by Ron Riekki

“Arrests made as hundreds protest Ann Coulter speech” 

—Los Angeles Times, November 20, 2019

Walking to the grocery store, I turn a corner to see
dozens of cops in riot gear, them loading vans
with weapons, the militarization of the police
where I see more of them in this minute—as I walk
nervously through their bulletproof everything—
than I had seen in a decade of small-town life,
but this is the time of riots and gear, of fire and fear,
and I remember walking to the same store just after
the last riot where the ground held footprints in blood
where I could see the exact path where someone had run
for their life, and my neighbor told me, "I bet today
was the hottest day it’s ever been here,” and there’s
a streetlight gone, the post yanked out of the ground.


Ron Riekki’s most recent book is Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice (Michigan State University Press).

FACING IGNORANCE

by Erle Kelly

“We reserve the right not to serve
anyone and I’m not serving you.”
The burly restaurant owner
points his finger at Aaron.
Three of us get belligerent,
stand up but Aaron quickly
steps in between us and the owner:
“Hey guys, let’s go; he’s just ignorant.”

In early 1963 I’m on a two-day military
pass in Mobile---a night-on-the-town---
with a group of cadet buddies.
We need a bathroom call
and find one in a public building.
“Hey Kelly, not that one, it’s Colored.”
I glance up: Men, Women and Colored
marked boldly over the bathrooms.

In the mid-Sixties, while off duty
on flight patrol, a crew member
lends me To Kill A Mockingbird.
Reading it, I can’t help but recall
what Aaron endured a few years before.

Over fifty years have passed.
I’ve lost contact with Aaron.
I wonder what he’s thinking now?
I turn the TV on to a split screen.
On one President Obama pleads
for calm and peaceful demonstrations.
On the other, Ferguson is burning.


Erle Kelly lives in Long Beach California and graduated from CSU Long Beach. He has been published in The New Verse News, Chiron Review and Silver Birch Press.  For several years he has been in a local poetry workshop conducted by Donna Hilbert, noted writer and poet in the Southern California area.

WE ARE THE FLAMES

by Adrian Ernesto Cepeda

A demonstration to demand authorities find 43 missing college students, in Mexico City, this week. Mexico officially lists more than 22 thousand people as having gone missing since the start of the country's drug war in 2006, and the search for the missing students has turned up other, unrelated mass graves.

Hear us strike our match,
our voices glowing
over this capital—
our lower case demands
will only grow louder,
nuestras voces ponderosas
hear us from your palace,
so much fuel in our voices
your quiet fuels to inspire us—
our marching bellow.
The world welcomes
our fire united we, students
as sisters and brothers,
together— you will hear
our loudest uprising.
Somos la llama de Mexico.
Wrapped in our flags
colors of green, white
and red; spirit of águila’s—
We Are The Flames.
El cielo can feel us—
our spirits uniting?
Your silence
will never divide this city,
our country—
Presidente, you will
remember our names.


Adrian Ernesto Cepeda is an L.A. poet whose work appears in the new True Romance Poems collection, 1000 Tankas for Michael Brown, The Lake Poetry, Edgar Allen Poet Journal # 2, Fukushima Poetry Anthology, San Gabriel Valley Poetry Quarterly, Spilt Ink Poetry, Luna Luna Magazine’s Latino Poetry Project, Love Poetry Lovers, ZO Magazine, Oddball Magazine, The Rain, Party, & Disaster Society, Men's Heartbreak Anthology and in the soon to be released publications: Purrfect Poetry Anthology and Poetry in Motion’s collection Poems to Fuck To. He is currently enrolled in the MFA Graduate program at Antioch University in Los Angeles.

INK THREATS

by B.Z. Niditch

A series of demonstrations concerning the anti-fascist hip-hop artist, Pavlos Fyssas’ murder by Giorgos Roupakias, supporter of the Greek political neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn, are organized in European capitals by Greek immigrants and local left-winged organizations and students. - Greek Reporter         Meanwhile, mass protests against police abuses have resumed in the Turkish city of Istanbul, as well as in Ankara, the national capital, and in Antakya province on the Syrian border. The latest country-wide demonstrations began after the death on September 10 of Ahmet Atakan, a male aged 22, in Antakya. -- Gatestone Institute

Because poems
touch your faraway eye
and dictators
flee from word memory
silence cannot conceal us
from any occupying justice
our initials in blood
rise on city graffiti walls
over roofs and presses
others are written
with bark of hundred years
on old trees,
whether in Turkey or Greece
or anywhere on headlines
we hear impure speech
of the general staffs
who wage war
against people
even in nuclear times
only with ink threats
of our pens
can fascism be exposed
and die off.


B.Z. Niditch is a poet, playwright, fiction writer and teacher. His work is widely published in journals and magazines throughout the world, including: Columbia: A Magazine of Poetry and Art; The Literary Review; Denver Quarterly; Hawaii Review; LeGuepard (France); Kadmos (France); Prism International; Jejune (Czech Republic); Leopold Bloom (Budapest); Antioch Review; and Prairie Schooner, among others. He lives in Brookline, Massachusetts.

AFTER THE VERDICT

by David Radavich

Howard University Medical Students (Image source: Carmar Descamento-Park)

There’s no end
to the battles.

My heart
can’t take
so much fighting,

yet it goes on
spinning
and spinning

like silk
of a forgotten
tapestry.

I am not alone.
You are not alone.

The ramparts
are worth climbing.

The ramparts
are life,

the moat death,
slow and inexorable.

We must
carry our swords

as if we
were masters,

cross the
infested waters,

call out
justice
to the wind,

sing our
blood home

in unison
climbing high

into
the fortress.


David Radavich’s recent collections include America Bound: An Epic for Our Time (2007), Canonicals: Love’s Hours (2009), and Middle-East Mezze (2011).  His plays have been performed across the U.S., including six Off-Off-Broadway, and in Europe.  His new collection, The Countries We Live In, will come out later this year.