Fw: Poetry Contest

[Audrey Coward]

Here is Joelle's poem

Audrey




    I'm breathing the smoke
    of gunshots, mortars, missiles,
     and oil wells burning.
     I'm stirring in the night,
     hearing children crying and mothers keening

    It has the grit of desert sandstorm.

    The night sky is torn by explosives,
    cut by the arc of a missile.
    There's no place far enough
     to put my heart at ease.

    Can I buy another chance?

     I want to refuse to take sides.

    I want to imagine a world
     more spacious and more intimate.
     I want the courage to buy
     homes and meals and schoolbooks
     instead of guns and tanks
.
     I want to be peace, wild and fierce and sweet.


April, 2003
 Joelle Lyons Everett

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