AND SOMEBODY LAY THIS BOOK DOWN

A found poem of lines selected from the transcript of the January meeting of the McMinn County, Tennessee School Board considering the removal of the Pulitzer Prize winning book Maus from their curriculum teaching about the Holocaust.

by Dick Westheimer

Cartoon by Andy Marlette, Pensacola News Journal, January 29, 2022

     “There are no dangerous thoughts; thinking itself is dangerous.” 

― Hannah Arendt

You see the naked pictures. You see the razor.

You see the blade where the mom is cutting herself. 

You see her laying in a pool of her own blood.

Please, somebody lay this book down.

Sure, we do the Holocaust, but we have

processes and procedures in place here. 

We can tell the kids what happened, but we don’t need 

all the nakedness and all the other stuff.

Can I lay that in front of a child?

It ain’t happening. It is not happening.

It’s like when you’re watching TV 

and a cuss word or nude scene comes on

and you don’t look at it. You don’t look at it.

Again, reading this to myself, it was decent 

until the end. Until the end,

I really enjoyed it. I liked it. 

The end was stupid, though.

It shows people hanging, it shows them 

killing kids. It is not wise or healthy

Somebody lay this book down and say 

Look it was taught! Look it was taught! 

Say! Look! It was taught!

If I was trying to indoctrinate somebody’s kids, 

this is how I would do it. You put this stuff just so, 

this vulgarity, and the kids, they soak it in.

We don’t need the scene of the mice hanging from the tree.

We don’t need all the nakedness and all the other stuff.

We don’t need the curse words and foul language.

I never had a book with a naked picture in it! 

I never had a book with foul language!

So I vote to do away with the book.

I Vote To Do Away With The Book!

And somebody lay this book down, because

somebody will say look, it was taught in the classrooms. 

So, Madam Chairman. I’m going to bring this to a head. 

I started it so now I am going to bring it to a head. 

I move that we remove this book.

I move that we remove this book!

Dick Westheimer has—in the company of his wife Debbie—lived, gardened and raised five children on their plot of land in rural southwest Ohio. He is a Rattle Poetry Prize finalist. In addition, his recent poems have appeared or are upcoming in Pine Mountain Sand and Gravel, Rise Up Review, Sheila Na-Gig, Snapdragon Journal of Art and Healing, and Cutthroat.

CIRCLES

by Jenna Le

Image source: CP4

Once, I was so young

that, like a raw onion,

my concentric circles reluctant

to relax their grip on

one another’s whiteness,

a whiff of me could make you cry.

I had so much power,

but all I wanted

was to see people smile

when I walked into a room.

So I kept mum about

my real opinions

so that people would like me.

And it worked. I began to

feel smug about my popularity.

When I saw a rabble-rouser

hoisted on the gallows,

I sneered,

thinking he would not

be hanging there

if, like me, he knew

the secret to being liked.

When I saw a man

with six circular gunshots

in his face and chest

sprawled on crimson cement,

I did not say, “There but for the grace…”

I did not believe

in favors. I believed

I had carved my own niche

in the world using

my smarts, my likability.

I had a vivid memory

of myself with a penknife

in my hand, carving,

never thinking to ask

how that bloody knife

ended up in my hand,

or whose blood it was.

Jenna Le is the author of Six Rivers (NYQ Books, 2011), which was a Small Press Poetry Bestseller. Her poems have appeared in AGNI Online, Bellevue Literary Review, Massachusetts Review, The Southampton Review.

MY BROTHER

by Kelly Jadon

A Palestinian laborer in Israel. Image source: Jerusalem Post

he works with his hands

digging, building, construction

labor

tunneling mountains

putting up walls of steel

one week and three hours

away from home

as many men

to feed families in the north

each Sabbath, driving highway

with cash, eggs, vegetables

a smile, a hug, treats for five children

dinner kept warm

chicken with sumac,¹ roasted batata²

fattoush³

yet, my brother is late today

we wait

his wife, Nagla, calls his cell

it rings, no answer

two hours

she phones again

and again, no answer

time moves slowly in the East

with God—in His time

finally, the call comes

not my brother—another

his voice, dry as crackers

raspy, hoarse

Nagla screams

unsure, I take the phone

“allo?”

…”your brother, ahhok,⁴

he was found, hung,

from the 4^th story…”

recoiling in shock

my mind recalls

John—who died on Patmos⁵

Stephen—outside the gate

with stones⁶

and Peter—who like

my brother,

was taken where he

did not wish to go⁷

“a nightmare” cries Nagla

our mother tongue

a cousin

my brother’s faith

the world cannot comprehend

for kosmos⁸ thinks as the Cretans⁹

fleshy,

and is natural

without Spirit

full of sin

autopsy, three days, Nazareth

we buried him today

within our crypt—

all others pushed aside

making room for his box

the city present—though media

stayed away—left unreported

yet 30,000 saw the truth

of one of the least of these

who came to bid him goodbye

kiss his coffin

scream, cry

this one, my blood, our blood

he is—one of us

the body

his blood, like Abel’s,

cries from the ground beneath

our crypt

covered over with the Blood

of al Messiah¹⁰

awaiting the Great White Throne

when bodies rejoin spirit and soul

“Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord.”

Who sees all, knows all

--even, the evil intentions of men

whose wrong thoughts toward murder

led them to believe that

no one is watching

_________________________________________________________________

1. sumac—an edible Middle Eastern ground spice

2. batata—Arabic for potato

3. fattoush—a Middle Eastern salad which includes squares of dried or fried pita

4. ahhok—Arabic for brother

5. Patmos—a Greek island in the Aegean Sea, meaning  “my killing”

6. Acts 7:56-60, Bible

7. John 21:18-19, Bible

8.  kosmos—Koine Greek for “the world”

9. Cretans—Koine Greek for those from the Greek island of Crete, meaning “fleshy”

10. al Messiah—Arabic for “the Messiah”

Author' note on the poem: A story that has gone unreported, but just happened a few days ago--to an in-law, in Tel Aviv.

Kelly Jadon is a graduate of Spring Arbor University and holds a degree in English with a concentration on poetry.  She is a teacher, poet, and writer.  Her poem "To Taste The Oil" was recently featured at the University of Colorado "Eye Contact" event as an audible poem.  Her poetry has been published both online and in print in several literary journals. Her poetry book To Taste the Oil: The Flavor of Life in the Middle East was published in June 2014 by Into The Deep Books.