Sharon to Cheney to Chavez


When Ariel Sharon was felled by a massive stroke, there were many voices raised in grave concern that the situation in the Middle East would be further destabilized. But aside from a natural urge for the good health of an individual human, is it healthy for any society, especially those who style themselves as democratic, to place such exaggerated hope and faith on the shoulders of one man? Not to take a poke at Israel, this is a dynamic evinced by most every "democracy" in the world --- none more egregiously than the present-day USA. Indeed, democracy, rule by the people, would seem impossible when one man is endowed with godlike powers by the people he's supposedly serving.

And "man" is unfortunately the operative word here, because this John Wayne-like phenomenon, the need for one strong tough-talkin' guy to straighten out all the lesser mortals (like the Duke takin' Maureen O'Hara over his knee and givin' her a good lickin')
seems deeply rooted in the skulls of many people all around the world.

Wake up, tribes of the planet. On balance, our 3,000 years of patriarchy has been a series of unmitigated, unnecessary catastrophes, including the burning of a lot of women, cats, and books.

Dick Cheney carries this musky ethos to embarrassing extremes, as was made grotesquely plain by the recent unpleasantness of "the-quail-that-got-away." A hallmark of this manly mode of operation: getting your victim to apologize to you! Don't worry, Mr. Whittington, the women in your life can help you navigate these waters. They're used to this crap.

Hugo Chavez, an iconoclast somehow overlooked by the Sundance Channel, holds out a small measure of hope in Venezuela as long as he doesn't believe his own hype. Can he remember his mission to finally exalt the historically downtrodden, or will he soon be demanding genuflections and curtseys of his own? Don't go there, Hugo. Get a good court jester and listen attentively to their jibes.

Democracy cannnot continue to thrive under its present working definition --- two opposing parties that fight each other tooth & claw with a reptilian reflexivity while 70% to 80% of the populace look on aghast, wishing these guys could find a way to cooperate and bring some kind of rational improvement into their everyday lives.

You're probably aware by now that a lot of the best bits of the U.S. Constitution were lifted from the ancient code of the Iroquois Confederacy. Other than generic Rousseau-isms nothing remotely resembling the egalitarian framework of our democracy existed in 18th century Europe. And Rousseau himself seems to have stolen much of his inspiration from a distant, somewhat muddled reading of the social structure and philosophy of certain North American Indian nations.

Paramount in my mind within the Iroquois design is (1) the emphasis on consensus over conflict, (2) the protection of the voice and the rights of the minority, and (3) the incorporation of a politically disinterested, authoritative feminine influence not only in policy decisions, but in the most fundamental activity of any political entity --- selecting the leaders. It's my understanding that in many of the original North American nations the Clan Mothers, or other wise female elders, held the responsibility for identifying those who would most effective, honorably, and selflessly lead the people. These extraordinary women observed the behavior of children through all the stages of growing and were able to form a complete evaluation of the person's character by the time they reached young adulthood. Unimaginable as it may seem, until we find some way to incorporate a wise, comprehensively altruistic feminine viewpoint into our national policy decisions as well as the selection of our leaders, I see little hope for any major improvements flowing out of the present system, sometimes referred to nebulously as "democracy".

As a first step toward this ideal, we could learn a lot from the people of Bolivia, who had to fight in the streets last year to finally get a leader who spoke from their own hearts and souls. Evo Morales is a Quechua Indian and former coca farmer, not a globalized corporate clone. He would not be president today if the streets of La Paz had not been filled with crowds chanting, "The people united shall never be defeated."


---------------- Lp

epigraph ^^^ "Those who can't remember the past are doomed
to eat repeatedly at McDonald's."

Not Just The Sky


Twenty years ago last month, I walked into a library in Columbia, S.C. for a little session in free association. I walked out of there realizing that my poetry had truly been born on that day. I was in an unusually receptive state in January, '86 --- floating in a nebulous transitional medium bearing only a superficial resemblance to the noxious fog of a mid-life crisis. It had recently occurred to me, like a punch in the gut, that I'd been in the same job for 7 years. Up until that time, I'd never bothered to hold a job for over a year, so I found the 7-year mark rather troubling.

Somewhat disoriented, shambling into a university library that must've looked ultra-modern in 1957, I picked 2 or 3 volumes of the Encyclopedia Brittanica with the project of perusing them at random. Beginning with 'Freon to Hokkaido' or some similarly surrealistic title from the set, the reassuringly hefty book fell open at 'Helios'. It seemed propitious, immediately encountering a sun god, and as I read the short entry, I was struck by the part of the god's journey that was unknown to me through the more familiar travels of Apollo --- not the blazing passage with straining sky-horses pulling the chariot across the daytime sky, but the fragile subterranean night-passage to get back to the point where dawn begins once more.

By the time I left the library, I had the poem fully written down and carried the realization that for some inexplicable reason, I was now a poet and not a dabbler. As a bonus, there was an implicit promise in the air that I would be allowed a dispensation to ply my craft without fear of writer's block or an evaporating pool of inspiration as long as I respected the time and place and the process by which these mystical arias revealed themselves. And that's pretty much the way things have worked out.

So you could say, like a UFO enthusiast, that this message came out of the sky somewhere near the confluence of Green and Sumter Streets on January 16th, '86 and you might not be wrong.......


Not Just The Sky

Helios sailed.
But not just the sky by brighest rays,
Also the night waters with spires enfolded
Through northern cataracts in a coracle.
Aching from the arc of lighting,
Aching 'til the swirl of sleep
Meshed with the river, sea-surrounded.

All shadow's angles
Described by our transits underneath.
The hopeless abiding need for ruling chariots,
Bashed longing for freedom among flanks,
Liniment bestowed after the scheduled glow
And before out notice finally doesn't escape
The sun in a teacup.

______------__--- Lp

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