E.J. ANTONIO

WHITE HOUSE CHRISTMAS 2003

Texas born volunteers
decorate rooms in tinsel
big and bigger nutcrackers
greet the privileged
 

The chosen pine
its growers welcomed
on the Great Lawn
the first lady’s ornamental smile
 

Her gilded praises
strangles my sensibilities
then creeps like kudzu vines
to the next conquest
 

At twilight
the president stands
before his people
utters the unbelievable
 

Wishes for peace
as he flips the switch
lights the people’s tree
more soldiers die
 

For this White House
Christmas means
comb the ancient sand
to capture who - to find what
 

As our peacekeepers
label and wrap the gifts
FedEx will not deliver
U.S. bodies – shells cracked
 

the innards scrambled
by stealth’s children
martyrdom for a god
patriotism for a dollar
 

AllGoBoomAllFallDown
 

1/

Providing [me with what – wouldn’t give me anything – after 9/11 – ignored me and mine]

Appropriate [only in the reasoning minds of unreasonable people]

Tools [essential to building another weapon of mass destruction]

Required to [sustain a super power’s divine right of global manifest destiny]

Intercept and [control and steal minority majority’s resources]

Obstruct [peaceful co-existence – it adds to the surplus population]

Terrorism [is greed / unholy genocide perfected by all the flag waving kings]

Act [destructive]

2/

knobby minded / human boll weevils hungry for more / More / MORE / and the earth is a battered woman

her tears should have long ago drowned her fattened abusers / who fall graceless as blue footed boobies

into her attractive minerals and ores / evolution’s perennials / keeps her tormenters alive

    3/   

she tires of their patronizin’ ways

              she cries stop misappropriating her treasures

                      and they tighten the stranglehold

    she resists

                                             they immediately strike back

                                                  all opposition expects

                                                                    terminal violence

                                                         senseless

4/

patriots flirt as they walk / the demilitarized zone of terrorism lives everywhere in the world

wears every face / comes in every color  every gender / spouts every creed / each one fightin’ himself

destroyin’ herself / reinventin’ themselves / damnin’ US and then We

All

  Go

    Boom

         Ashes blown To Ashes floatin' till

We

All

Fall

Straight

D

o

w

n

E.J. Antonio lives in Mount Vernon, NY. She has attended the Sarah Lawrence College Writer’s Conference and recently completed her second Cave Canem regional workshop. She is on the founding committee of The Poetry Caravan, which encourages poets to volunteer to give readings and workshops at Westchester area nursing homes and shelters. She has appeared as a featured reader at the Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture and frequently reads at open-mike sessions in New York City, Brooklyn and Westchester.