I am Ned Flanders!
Which Simpsons Character are YOU?

This is my poem of conscience. Maybe the President will read it and it'll make him choke on a pretzel or something.

*War Is a Joke... and I'm not Laughing*

I saw Viggo on Charlie Rose wearing a home-made t-shirt that said, "no more blood for oil"
I saw the way they explained him away as if an obstruction to the escapism of entertainment
I saw the pseudo-intellectual post-modernist writing another page to his autobiography at the bar at the coffee shop
And I wondered if the chapters of his book will be about writing at the bar at the coffee shop
I saw the children rejoicing in Palestine and Iraq at the prospect of free candy and what appeared to be Amerika's demise
I also saw the prayer service
The zealots praying, "Dear God, kill the fuckers that did this"
Or praying, "Dear Allah, be with them in this time of need"
I watched in horror as the world melted into the palm of a dick-tator's hand
I heard them saying, "We killed them to save them" and citing Numbers 31:17
I saw the doves and hawks competing for breadcrumbs thrown at the dirt by the tourists of terror
I saw the candles, the infinite candles, melting and the wax blending and pouring over into the flower box
I watched in quiet desperation as storm troopers with gas masks trampled the flowers that once grew
I saw the dispossessed huddled in the corners of Western society with pockets full of herbs and heads full of ideas
For a fleeting moment I could see a beautiful existance where the only law is that of egalitarianism
I watched my friend spike his hair into a mowhawk because it made him feel like a righteous social misfit
I watched and I watched and I watched television in my angst ridden boredom
I played with fire because I thought it would change things
I disguised myself as a Democrat and wrote angry letters of protest to Hillary Clinton
I hid my face behind a black dandana like a villan in an old Western melodrama
I did everything I could
But Amerika still wouldn't see

I support this:

From: Sam Hamill, founder of Copper Canyon Press, Port
Townsend WA

January 19, 2003

Dear Friends and Fellow Poets:

When I picked up my mail and saw the letter marked
"The White House," I felt no joy. Rather I was
overcome by a kind nausea as I read the card enclosed:

Laura Bush
requests the pleasure of your company
at a reception and
White House Symposium on
"Poetry and the American Voice"
on Wednesday, February 12, 2003
at one o'clock

Only the day before I had read a lengthy report on the
President's proposed "Shock and Awe" attack on Iraq,
calling for saturation bombing that would be like the
firebombing of Dresden or Tokyo, killing countless
innocent civilians.

I believe the only legitimate response to such a
morally bankrupt and unconscionable idea is to
reconstitute a Poets Against the War movement like the
one organized to speak out against the war in Vietnam.

I am asking every poet to speak up for the conscience
of our country and lend his or her name to our
petition against this war, and to make February 12 a
day of Poetry Against the War. We will compile an
anthology of protest to be presented to the White
House on that afternoon.

Please submit your name and a poem or statement of
conscience to:
kokua@olympus.net

There is little time to organize and compile. I urge
you to pass along this letter to any poets you know.
Please join me in making February12 a day when the
White House can truly hear the voices of American
poets.

Sam Hamill

I'm at school right now. It's my second day of my second semester of college. I'm liking the classes I've had so far: Environmental Science, Philosophy, Sociology, Art and coming up at 1:15 is Anthropology. I'm interested in all those subjects, so I don't think I'll have a problem with boring classes this semester. Anyway, yall don't care about my schooling. Here's a poem. I probably could have structured the lines a little better (more sentence like) so they made more sense, but what ya gonna do.

*This Watch Says Yr Blind*

Friday bleeds into Saturday which bleeds into Sunday which fades into a deep blue Monday where the sun refuses to shine and the street lights only cast shadows
8am is a black widow spider enticing her prey, luring him with sex and excitment into the alleyway where no light can touch
The red illumination that burns the tired dreamer's eyes and scolds the tireless wanderer with a wage-system notion of scheduling seems bright against the black hole of digital clock
A post-industrial conception of time and the unnatural color of neon lights makes sure we don't step out of our roles as zombies in a made-for-television horror flick
They'll pass our act off as entertainment
A life size flea circus to sour the taste of bread and roses
But there's nothing entertaining about watching lemmings follow eachother over a cliff and into the pyre of Gehenna after you've seen it so many times
Even violent stupidity gets boring after a while
And so the half-hour-time-slot scheduling for the after-hours wage-system where we all pay mental rent ultimately defeats itself
Like a snake whose motto is "Join or Die" struggline to swallow its own tail whose motto is "Don't Tread On Me"
Time burns a hole in time and the natural illumination comes shining through
Humanity has come full circle
We've turned back the clocks again to the tribal ways of green anarchy
But have we only tipped the hourglass on its head
Of have we smashed it and scattered the sand over the cemetary lawn like the ashes of a friend who we all used to know but eventually somehow lost touch with

a mouse scurries around on the floor on which you walk lightly and gracefully
you are watching every step
careful at every corner
a mouse runs around trying to be the last ray of hope
you are walking slowly
the mouse's feet move swiftly
you step down and for a moment are distracted by the beaming sunlight in the stained glass window
the mouse stops at the wrong second
and it's all over
but we all gotta go sometime