Poets Against War continues the tradition of socially engaged poetry by creating venues for poetry as a voice against war, tyranny and oppression.
Daniel Abdal-Hayy Moore
62 years old
Philadelphia, PA
Born in 1940 in Oakland, California, his first book of poems, Dawn Visions, was published by Lawrence Ferlinghetti of City Lights Books, San Francisco, in 1964. He became a Muslim/Sufi in 1970, performed the Hajj in 1972, and lived in Morocco, Spain, Algeria and Nigeria. In 1996 he published The Ramadan Sonnets, and in 2001 a new book of poems, The Blind Beekeeper. He lives in Philadelphia.
WAR
War bubbles up in the tea we're about to drink between the alligators who live there and the giant dragonflies who want to
A lumpy black form pulls itself up from the murky dregs
When the war is over a white cloth will fall from the sky whose hem will be drenched in blood
I hope no one notices the heavy breathing in the corner where the war began
I hope no one's fortunate enough to have won
11/9/2002
As an American poet born in 1940, living through the Vietnam debacle, becoming Muslim in 1970, horrified as anyone by the tragedy of 9/11, gut-wrenched by all the tyrants of the world and the sad predominance of them as well over Muslim populations, angered repeatedly by my country's refusal to find parity and justice in Israel/Palestine, and now about to try to take over control of the Middle East via Iraq, I add my name to the list of poet protesters whose sympathetic hearts may also be open to inspirations from beyond the purely human domain. The Divine Will always remains with the just, though at the end of the day we may be surprised at the outcome, and no amount of rhetoric can veil His Light.
A THOUSAND ARMIES / ALL THE DEAD CHILDREN
A THOUSAND ARMIES
And the hapless Soldier’s sigh Runs in blood down Palace walls -- William Blake
A thousand armies sat on a wall and everyone of them was dead
eating sandwiches out of little tin boxes yellow broken teeth and considerable chewing
But their eyes were not that interested in seeing their eyes didn’t follow anything moving in front of them or look as they pulled the waxed paper away from their bread or broke open their bottles of water or sat with their friends
There was a constant murmuring like a stomach churning its juices a constant scratching like animals caught between walls
They sat on a wall overlooking an orchard and each one of them was dead but they watched the seasons come to life on the vine in the vineyards and down the long crop rows though their eyes barely took it in and when the crops were harvested and the snows came they barely blinked they barely noticed
Thousands of armies dangling their legs bootless in heaven eating sandwiches out of little silver boxes their eyes transformed from burning buildings and people running into the streets to green fields full of lions and lambs and other wingéd animals lying together
though their eyes were always elsewhere
and their hearts were as round as the world
3/23
ALL THE DEAD CHILDREN
Angels are learning new tricks to entertain all the dead children just bringing them to a quiet place used to be enough blue panels sonorous as cool winds rising to infinite heights and luminous rivers tasting of fresh milk and passionflower honey
But now they are more restless and want something lively such as fabulous displays and real stellar extravaganzas to shut out the memories
All the wingéd horses have been brought in and every banner from every battle ever waged transformed into aurora borealis brightness is planted on either side of the great arena which is actually nowhere you can put your finger on and may be as big as a sparkle or light years across
The angels begin conventionally enough and since they’re anti-gravitational they are capable of some pretty amazing feats their specialty being a spinning array of a few billion shimmering their wings and turning slowly at first in a cone that goes up through so many dimensions the children have to stop counting with each dimension demarcated by another color no one on earth’s spectrum has ever seen before
Then the cone begins turning faster and faster and shoots higher and higher finally sweeping their astonished souls wide-eyed into a vortex so swift they barely notice that they’re arcing across fields of unearthly green and seas of unoceanic turquoise
Each shroud has been made into a tent filled with fabulous fruits and unidentifiable edibles of uttermost succulence
Each soul has been given the ultimate glimpse and the accurate portrayal the perfect sustenance and the infinite intensity
Each time they clap their hands a new universe appears more fabulous than the last
And when they tire of such delights William Blake reads to them from his new work and Mozart comes in and plays them a tune on a million pianos
