obscure or clear. the cypress is in pieces. there is only this. the cypress is in pieces. . >> a poem i wrote shortly after 9-11. the terrorists for rachel cory and all those who were idealists and who actually believed that they could make an effect and social change. the terrorists who lives amongst us is not you, the terrorist who lurks in the shadows of our crowded city streets isn't me. he's not a demon with bulging eyes, a twisted mouth full of dirt, a crooked mouth, fangs driping blood.

it's not the savage guner waiting for our school on their way to school. no, this heinous replica of satan doesn't look like a jew. dopt make a habit of supplying the motives of sin with colors of skin because it's skin deep. a student with dreams of statehood or a teenage girl driven by desperation and fear or a dentist or an apprentice of a dead soldier, who crouches in the wounds of the dead and the dying, who hurls stones at

tanks and encroaching soldiers, who stands unmoved before a roiling tank, who stares with barbed eyes. the enemy is never one who kills for no reason. the enemy is never one who must be vanquished at all cost. it is not so easy to kill from the inside, a shifting corridor of blame. not so easy to trace an intricate blame of betrayals and broken treaties. the enemy is not you, the enemy is not me. the enemy is muslim, christian, atheist, hindu, jew.

he is our collective face, our evolution, the devolution, the ripening of long injustices. thank you. the next poet is michael palmer. >> what of that wolf hound at full stride. what of the woman that serves as fairl guide and witness to the snowy hive? what of the singer robed in red and frozen at mid-song? and the stone, its brokenness, or the voice oft seen that says note the dragon seen but asking no questions of flight, no questions of irridescence, what of that century, did you see it pass? what of that wolf hound at your

back? and then a poem that is for mahmud darlish called the dream of narcissus. the dream of narcissus, that there would be a silence loud as time. the dream of the writer that there could be a silence loud as time, the dream of time that rest might come, the dream of rest, that unrest might arise. the dream of the palm, the pilgrims would enter the village. the dream of the village, that they depart with their palms and the house dreaming of his leveling and the exile as well, the dream of night that the day would be purified, the dream of day that the dark would be lifted, and the dream of the dream but who is to speak of this? i don't think this needs to be

explained, it's called mad man with broom. the realist crows return at earliest morning. and the madman with broom, madman in his night shirt with a broom, he, too, returns. he thinks to roust the crows from the mulberry boughs by jabing and swirling his broom, by crazily twirling his broom in the wet summer air and hurling curses skyward beyond the boughs and the crows toward the fading gods beyond the fading stars. but the realist crows know it is only a man in a nightshirt after dawn; that the broom is a broom and that his cries are nothing more than words and half words the heavy air will swallow. they rise anyway from the tree, as best to quiet him and let

morning be morning. soon enough they will return again by twos and threes, settling among the spreading limbs, their laughter the same before and after. catherine case is the next reader. . >> one is called the mountain by hashim hafik and it's translated by sadi samoi. i have washed the mountain, i have washed the stones and the pebbles that clings to the trees. i have washed the mountain. i have lit the paths and the back ways around the mountain. i have lit the caves and the stairs and the hidouts in the folds of the mountain. i have washed the summit and

every crevice of the mountain so my loved ones might pass in the forenoon of the mountain day. this is called, lament for a market place in babylon, by abdul karin al karid and it's a reference to a suicide bombing. this one and the next one are both translated by salim yusef. on this grave stone are angels and people weeping. what are people waiting for, their ship? here it comes, borne by the deluge. in a market place now frequented by money changers with beards and baggy trousers, who restores the limbs and who

throws open the gates for hollow-eyed gods coming in from babylon with red chests and white furious hair? i wonder who? on the day of march 1st in the 5th year after the second millennium, a massacre took place in babylon. it's my pleasure it introduce the next poet, george evans. . >> first, i would like to read a poem by my dear friend and wife, daisy samora, who was to be here today but is in nicaragua, keeping in mind what michael said about jorge and casablanca, i will read it in

her language or my spanish first, then in translation. it's a poem directly addressed to poets but certainly to activists as well. (speaking spanish) no man's land. we are a mine field of clarity

and whoever crosses the barbed wire comes back to life. but who is interested in crawling through undergrowth? who dares sail a tempest? who wants to come face to face with purity? that's why we're fenced off in this no man's land under permanent cross fire. three bomb holes. flag study. red. she walks into the bright vegetable garden, chopped water to life from brittle landscape, leans her hoe against goat wire, admires shoots balanced

on turned earth, looks up, fulfilleds a leaves sigh, clouds, hands on her hips, her jaw falls open and a bomb drops down her throat. white. the horizon, a black line against brilliant white landscape, pale blue sky above it, empty except for heat devil blur, a raindrop sound hits a wooden post against cloudless light, another, the lamb, his children, wife, then he drenched in bullet rain. blue. the final moment of night

passing, exposes limbs, torsos, heads, breasts, humans, cows, goats, curved and knotted heaps, lays blue against bitten grass. final piece, the title is the headline for a newspaper. anti-war activist immoh lates along kennedy's express way near giant flame of the millennium skull up tour 4 days before november 2006 elections and no one pays attention. everything but the heart reduced to ash. thank you.

. >> i just want to thank george for bringing to bear some of the numbers, some of the horrific things that are happening in iraq right now. this poem was drawn from my experiences in iraq from the culture, from the music and from its traditions. so i have dedicated this poem to iraq. i think it will be helpful for you to know el kubenchi, along with el watanabi. el kubenchi is famous for music, a great history and tradition of music, and he has taught all the gray modern singers of the 20th century who came out of iraq. his music has touched me and you will hear it in this poem,

32 beads on a string. i woke from the nightmare of a gutted macom, not because i have not yet bled my life in yellow, but because minarettes looking sky ward. one burly buffalo looking for hooves and hot breath because the skin is not yet numb and the lights are not yet flickering, i will continue to sip at my hot tea and stare at the dust-colored noon. one white dasha screams with the brilliance of red. can you hear them, the melodious intent, the glimmering mood in their eyes. face stitched by seam, a garment i have sewn to my skin.

whatever remains of el gubenchi's 1932 cairo studio recording lives between the old cobblestone quarter and my still-warm mahogony ear. i should have gotten up to shake his hand, this uncomfortable tension between me and god. medina, its streets adorned with smells from the bazaar, yet i have chosen to adorn myself in the still concrete of columns. i am for the transcription of the arabic. in the morning, he howled the song in the name of his father, perhaps new fathers weep at the

birth of their sons. do not cry for leila or for him, but drink the red wine and grow your love doublely, one for the ruby in the cup, the other for its rouge on your cheek. bombs rape the eyes of the sleeping assyrian gods. as if it were only a sand box, a few worthless grains of sand. i'll cut for you the last swathe of blue from the sky, sever my and if you'll let me, but for 5 minutes more, leave me to sleep without the knowledge of war. a kanun weeps near the funeral of music.

having been occupied, notes mourn for the loss of their song. i am for a concert of horses, the origin of gazelle leapt up from the heart of al gubungi. have you made small steps into the desert within us or listened for the gutterals longed deep within our throats, you would have come bearing gifts. i have nothing in red that i would not abide in green. el batanabi wrote the heart of our silken tanab, what need have we for you? no poem has ever enough red but that its blood might river beneath the veins of its people. beneath the desert sun, one man by one man by one man breathes

six. thousands of tons wrung sonorous from the sky. where is god? black-eyed woman, the street dogs are running wild. will you save me? simple white ignorance, even the desert has gone into hiding. there is no more meaning here than the crested moon holds towards a dying grove of date trees. i am for the arabic, for the transcription of the arabic, zato dates over fire-baked bread. the twin rivers have already called for us a history. our poets have already explained to us the desert. by what right have you come?

who have you have seen the rustic crane in the tree, no chimes but for its delicate wide beak, ushers an intemperate reprieve? 33 beads on a string, why pretend to know beyond the presence of click. thank you. please welcome gale sher >> the first one is why did she care? why did she care, she wondered, laying aside the book. a dim light could be seen possibly from a cabin reaching in not for the word, but for the space which a time.

fat drops driven violently side ways. the man's mind into which she tossed herself becomes a bird. fly away, bird. fly south where you are needed. letters moved, she could barely make them out. the sky moved, hanging bluntly. a circle swayed toppled to the sea. to you, sea, i chant and to the one with ears, hearing you into me. this one is called, having eaten fish. having eaten fish, i open

myself to make them more comfortable. i pet the fawn, twisting my calves. two fish leap, kiss, and die. fish, fry here, oh my fish, sway grass in coin of rain so far we kill the all of fishes presides while i walk by, covering my head. the last one is, my bones are in the mountain. my bones are in that mountain, in the veil of flowers beyond its southern pass. slipped down to me by the sky

long ago. broken, a coterie of lambs thought of as a bush. the land was yellow and contained a tree. a man tied to a pole looked up. he is praying and others, too, are glancing eastward. oh, house of cans, i squat, wind blows. to replace its word is why i gather mushrooms in sticky sun i squat, peaceful juice spills on my gaping pant leg finally, finally. the mountain becomes a cloud, slouching south, following the man. and it's my great pleasure to

present beau. . >> this is called lesson. trying to pull yourself back along the words, trying to get close to what holds the flesh to them. so you talk over the words. you shout to the words and the words sometimes begin, just begin to drag you along like a bad leg, to carry you to a place where they can turn and knife-like skin you into other words and move you closer, try to kill you, keep you there or let you hear, however briefly, their deadly harmony.

this is called markings and it's in two parts. one, the last is leveled. the eye witnesses are moved to a yard, a street. the road is made smooth. two, we have the ability to not regret, not one death and then exactly two even before another. and in this approximate silence we have felt that not regreting has spared us loneliness. called at the door. you did not tell me about these hours, how thick they were and

wounded. i hear myself telling someone to punch me just to figure the order of my beliefs. someone else in my clothes who would view this and move on. explain again the conditions that will bring along the morning and what it is here that convenes the night. and then the last poem is called upon living. they shove your feet out of the smokestack kitchen. they narrow the big sea sba a line of your sweat and then they take away your last word and then they take away another. now you put the keys back in

your pocket and now you push on the door until it is in flame, until it is in flame. next reader is jane herschfield. . >> one sand grain among the others in winter wind. i wake with my hand held over the place of grief in my body. depend on nothing, the voice advices, but even that is useless. my ears are useless, my familiar and intimate tongue, my protecting hand is useless that wants to hold the single leaf to the tree and say, not this one. this one will be saved.

a poem written on september 15th, 2001, against the knowledge that exactly what would happen was probably going to happen. the dead do not want us dead. the dead do not want us dead. such petty errors are left for the living. nor do they want our mourning. no gift to them. not rage, not weeping. return one of them, any one of them, to the earth and look. such foolish skipping, such telling of bad jokes, such feasting. even a cucumber, even a single

anise seed, feasting. and, last poem, foolish of me and yet optimism. the title is only optimism. the other part was a preface. more and more, i have come to admire resilience, not the simple resistance of a pillow whose foam returns over and over to the same shape, but the sinuous tenacity of a tree finding the light newly blocked on one side, it turns in another. a blind intelligence, true, but out of such persistence arose turtles, rivers, mitochondria,

figs, all this resinous, unretractable, earth. the next reader is summer brenner. . >> i'm going it read today an excerpt from anana, queen of heaven and earth. i wanted to say a few words about anana. this is the oldest literary work that we have. these are the cuniform tablets that were excavated in the late 1880's and early 1890's by the university of pennsylvania. tens of thousands of fragments of cuniform fragments. the story of anana starts in her adolescence. it travels through her journey as a queen and a goddess, and much of her story is devoted to the love, a very