It has been suggested that the Trump regime wants to limit the counter-terrorism investigations to “Islamic Terrorism” and not worry about domestic terrorism. This being planned in face of the fact that most acts on USA soil have been the result of home-grown American terrorists, mostly white and mostly Christian. Today there is a growing resistance to Trump but if not Trump, who? Do people think Pence will be an improvement? Things may be less scary, but will they really be much better with the Republican aristocracy calling the shots instead of the Republicans. It is clear virtually all of the Republican office holders seem to be more interested in power and money than patriotism, but are Democrats so different, or are they simply not the ones in power. I think with all of the distortions of language, the euphemisms for lying, the evasions of truth, the avoidance of reality, it might be valuable to define our terms while we work towards a common set of goals. With that in mind I offer up a look at the word terrorism.
terrorism defined
1.
i was a child
when i first saw the pictures
black men’s bodies
hanging from trees
castrated
burnt
picnic
laughed
the men and women
with their children
nigger cookout
some of them seemed to speak
into the camera lens
the smell of burnt flesh
fresh in their nostrils
i’ve been against terrorism
for a long time
2.
as a teen read pieces of the rise and fall
of the 3rd reich
not much more than a footnote
the points on jewish flesh stretched into lampshades
which, as it happened, echoed the fate of
slave rebellion leader nat turner a hundred years earlier
when his lush hued skin was cut and dried
and then fashioned into a purse and
a never quite translucent lamp shade
displayed in his captor’s home
i’ve been against terrorism
for a long time
stood and marched
as vietnam warriors
would come and go leaving
chemical forests, massive graves
and skulls presaging
cambodian death trails
one half a million
iraqi children are dead
the first from poisoned water
then more from disease
and starvation
every thirty days
thirty-five hundred young people waste away
as if someone was blowing up
a child-full world trade center
inside of iraq every single month
and now america cries
speaks mournfully of mothers
who could not come home from work
fathers who had houses and dreams
turned to bone ash that got caught in our
phlegm-fill lungs and tear-spilling eyes
and yes we cry
for the loses of all of those
who were loved
who are loved
who are bombed
who were incinerated
who came to rest under hundreds of tons
of concrete and iron
plaster and glass
in barbarous acts
like so many others
that i have lived under
that i have seen grow
terrorism that’s personal
a man dragged behind a truck
until his arm is pulled from socket
his leg torn from hip
his head sawed from neck
terrorism that’s intimate
a woman raped invaded assaulted beaten
bruised broken by men
strangers and lovers
family every two minutes
terrorism that’s official
a night stick pushed up a black man’s anus
as a station full of police turn their heads
ignore the screams
a west african immigrant shot at 42 times
until 19 bullets make him
crumbles in his own doorway
while trying to show his papers
terrorism that’s global
i have lost my mother my father
my brother my sister my hope
i have lost my family
so i have lost my hope
cries a man who speaks
after the bombing of his
afghani village
as the terrorists advance
boldly waving their flags
america i hear you sing that
liberty is your mother
is it daddy then who rapes
because america
it is you who feeds
this monster its largest meals
you who stokes its hottest fires
no
you are not alone
and no
you were not the first
but now america you
set the standard
look at the people you have killed
start anywhere in your history
any day
the first days
this morning
spin a globe in your hand
and look where your armies live
look where they draw weapons
look where their armaments are used
but as for this american-born woman
grown strong and free inside
your rotting belly
america
terrorism has been a regular part of my world
all my life and i have been fighting it
long as i can remember
saying no as loud as i knew how
no pledges needed
no waving flags required
no uniformed allegiance
recited with bandaged mouths
necks gripped
until one can barely breathe
let me state it clearly again and again
i’ve been against terrorism
for a long time
been
against terrorism
against all terrorism
against terrorism
against all terrorism
against terrorism
against all terrorism for forever