Saturday 5 January 2013

Remember Remember the 11th of November

The other night, my aunt convinced me to go to a poetry workshop where I was supposed to write a poem in the form of a letter to a fairy tale character. But there are two things about me one should know: 1) I suck at writing poetry and 2) I can't stay away from the topic of politics. So from the story of Little Red Riding Hood, my thoughts somehow strayed to Remembrance Day- a "holiday" that recently passed by and that always makes anti-war activists like me uncomfortable. Actually, now that I think about it, I guess what the two topics have in common is the image of the colour red, and that's probably exactly how my thoughts arrived here:

Poppy,
 When I look at you
I see blood,
I see violence,
I see a big red lie
pinned to the chests 
of murderers
who tell me
to support the troops 
and [insert more propaganda here].

Poppy, 
When I look at you
I see blood,
I see violence,
I see a big red lie
pinned to the chests
of murderers
who tell me
there is such a thing
as a just war
fought for freedom
and [insert another abstract value here].

Poppy,
When I look at you
I see blood,
I see violence,
I see a big red lie
pinned to the chests 
of murderers
who tell me
to remember
but also
 to forget
the truth.


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