"This Disgusting War"
"‘cuz I can’t take it anymore,/ just can’t/ take this cry in my ears and eyes and mouth/ with the blood of millions of nameless victims . . ." A Poem by Jimmy Santiago Baca
“This Disgusting War!” is from Jimmy Santiago Baca’s poetry collection Rita and Julia (City Works Press), which can be purchased here.
There’s a madness in me this morning-- feels like I have two hands on each side of my face, I’m a young colt for the first time with a saddle on my back and my eyes are maddened with rage and fear and I’m tossing and yanking my head back from these two hands that keep trying to put a bridle on me, nor do I want a harness around my head! I want to kick, scream, run and out gallop the fucking wind. But molten lead slowly hardens around my bones and the cry of freedom in me keeps racing down my arms–can’t get out here, the cry hurls itself against my chest--I can’t get out of my head, it scurries up my neck--can’t get out here, and I know what it is, times like these I want to open a bottle of mescal and pour a nice large drink in the afternoon heat and sit back on a bench somewhere in Arizona snug my cowboy hat down so the brim shades out sunlight and shoot rattlesnakes all afternoon, shoot at cars passing; shoot at hawks and eagles and vultures circling above shoot at INS prowling the border for Mexicans, spit black tobacco at my boot tips and shoot the scorpion trying to climb up my pants, then heel crush a tarantula-- this feeling is the gift the Universe gave me, the desperate need to express myself, the audacity and gall to think I have the right to call down the Gods and face them, confront them, defy their rule, question why they made this world in the way they did, not understanding any of it, the cry in my bones, encased in hardened lead so it can’t escape, the cry in my toes that have walked so many paths, the cry in my loins that have fucked so many passionate women, the cry in my mouth that has spoken so many prayers, the cry in my hands that touched so many beautiful things, the cry in my eyes that had seen such violence, the cry, the Horrifying, All-Engulfing, DARK cry that cries out to God and Creator and Universe why did you take my brother, why did you murder my parents why did you allow those children in the orphanage to be raped, why did you allow those innocent men in prison to die in their spirits, why must you Universe crush and smash and destroy what is beautiful give so little understanding-- I defy you, turn my back on you and weep the human cry weep the heart-choking cry, throat-gripping, lung-constricting weep for those you didn’t give a damn about! If ever God gave me the courage to hold court, I’d send those Pentagon generals to hell stuff a billion dollars up the asses of the Defense Department contractors and float them off the shores of the Pacific, because if you don’t know how to feel compassion if you’ve been smugly pampered in your moneyed privilege if you think you’re better because of your billions and never knew the fear of not having money to pay for food and utility bills, if your life has been a Tom Cruise/Britney Spears carousel ride, if life never challenged you because mama and papa napkin you every time you spilled milk down your chin if you can lie and cheat and cynically sneer at the less fortunate, I’d love to shoot you, I’d love to cage you up and starve you I’d love to bed you down with scorpions and corrupt senators for a month, not feed you a thing, not hear you cry pleading screams, dismiss you as a human being, tease with electrocution, not enough to kill you, but keep you shaking and screaming and I say this, because you are accountable for countless murders and rapes you have spawned on this land an evil that continually seeds new evil in innocent children, in the streets, in homes, in schools, in fields, in the air, in the heart, in the soul until even religious leaders and presidents have become evil prophets millions bow down before in terror-- I can’t I can’t! I can’t! endure the killing of Palestinians, Iraqis, Bosnians, Serbs, Israelis, Latin Americans, Africans we are burning Afghani women alive; we are assassinating millions of innocent people, we are killing millions with each spoonful of cereal, with each spa massage, with each trip to a ski resort, with each Olympic medal we celebrate, with each daily paper we read, and that’s what this cry is in me, the one I can’t get out, the one that haunts me, makes me want to lose myself in drugs and alcohol because when I walk down the street and see no one cares that we’re murdering millions, because when I look from my table and see lunch crowds all babbling about love and money and spouting happy-blissful new-age healing talk, I want to rise and smoke the motherfuckers, take them to where their corporate consciousness has never taken them, out of their nice investment portfolios and comfortable house slippers, out of their SUV’s, out of their lake retreats and grad school classrooms and career moves and Canyon Road Santa Fe mansions, take them and make them live the life of a small starving Mexican girl one day, live the life of a woman sold into slavery one day, live the life of an Afghani woman or Iraqi child, live the life of someone in jail, in prison, who just lost their soul to men that raped them, then let’s hear their talk, let’s hear their jovial laughter come from those contorted mouths still agape with horror… ‘cuz I can’t take it anymore, just can’t take this cry in my ears and eyes and mouth with the blood of millions of nameless victims all for the pleasure and greed of a few rich motherfucking men gathering in British hotels, Washington chambers or Pentagon Think Tanks, can’t take it… so I must now play this flute given me by a friend now dead, I must play this flute, drown out the cries of the murdered, I must dance my ballet, move so I sweat and worm and twist and leap and gasp with passionate breath, I must blow this saxophone so hard my face reddens and my cheeks balloon out, eyelids tight, blow man blow man! I must paint in my studio, walk in with rage and paint this madness into love, dance this madness into tears, write this poem so I can stop weeping and start dancing in the community with children, women and men, so I can open with mouth and vociferate my love vowels clearly, so I can use these arms to really bang my hands together to applaud so I can whimsically whirl in a dizzying joy for being alive and again praise the Creator for this life.
Jimmy Santiago Baca is an award-winning American poet and writer of Chicano descent. While serving a five-year sentence in a maximum security prison, he learned to read and began to turn his life around, eventually emerging as a prolific artist of the spoken and written word. He is a winner of the prestigious International Award for his memoir, A Place to Stand, the story of which is now also a documentary by the same title.