NO LITTLE GIRL RED IN GAZA

the PR of the Global North
is resurrecting clips
of Schindler’s List
showing us the moment
when looking down
from higher ground
Oskar Schindler singles out
a little girl in red
fleeing the nazi track-down
against a black-and-white background

the music is a tearful lament
and the film
artistically highlighting the color red
against grainy grays
and dark shades
was
red-carpetable
and Oscar-winning

but invariably
the clips stop
at the little girl in red
hiding
successfully under
an abandoned bed –
not showing
the later footage
of her limp
executed body
wheelbarrowed
by kapos off screen

on youtube
you have to pay
to see the rest –
her death –
the failure of the West

these are times
in Gaza
when death-lines,
the day-by-day imperialist deadlines,
are brazenly
followed to their own real time conclusion
with nothing left
on the editing floor –
the swerving red lines
of Joe Biden
deciding that
yes, civilians must be protected
but
oh no, Israel will be defended
and
the disappeared line
between the IDF
and Israeli families sharing picnics
of protest
against aid entering
at the Egypt border –
meanwhile
the distribution of watermelon
by the soldiers to the settlers,
is an obscene concession
to the color red

no right to physical integrity
no lifeline
no secured timeline
no dream of justice
will allow
the name of any child of Gaza
even colorlessly dressed
to be placed
on the lined-up column
of any neatly written list

THE RIGHT TO HOPE

“There is a right to Hope recognized by human rights law according to the Center For Constitutional Rights”
Laura Whitehorn speaking to the Mumia International Collectives on April 6th 2024

47% of those killed in Gaza are children.
Palestinian Health Ministry

in Gaza
this magical child marvels
that you never know
what you can recover
from the rubble
of what was once
your home

the memory
of an interrupted table laid
with steaming food
just prayed for –
are the shattered bowls
still full of what hunger
now dreams of ?

a bit of room
left intact
where toys still nap
waiting to be picked up
and taken back

a tricycle
unharmed
in working order
in the middle of a
no-child’s-land
of donkey drawn
hearses
and burnt cars

a shred of gleaming multi-colored
glass
from a crushed kaleidoscope
hidden from sight
of even the most advanced
AI target robots
– this child pockets
and treasures
the right to Hope

SHADES OF SILENCE

To all the comrades we take the pains to write to.

To Martin Luther King I met for a few minutes in my father’s study in 1959 when I was 17 years old… and I was tongue-tied silent …

i was always fascinated
by that milestone moment
when Martin Luther King
broke our silence
by telling us
there comes a time
when silence
becomes
betrayal

after those words
at Riverside Church
that day
the silent collective epiphany
spoke volumes

at what point
do
the blurred lines
the moving sands
the changing borders
between
silence
and
betrayal
manifest ?

ever since 1967
i have turned the signifier
silence
like a mental rubik cube
on all its facets

i looked up its etymology
to find that it comes
from silencium,
i discussed it with a linguist
to find that it shares the same root
as the word
still

so the immobility of silence
in our abolitionist movement
would be
an oxymoron

so the status quo of silence
in the ona move of revolution
would
be a contradiction

so the absence of movement
that is our silence
turns back the clock
of our Resistance

do you not hear
the whisper in your ear
of the ancestors ?

does not a simple emoji
break
an absence of reply ?

is not the rhythm of the drums
remembered
by your beating heart ?

does a poem
need to be shouted
to reverberate ?

does not a kite
riding the winds
murmur forever lines ?

does not Mother Earth
communicate ?

STILL-NESS

this depth of green
is still dense

this moment of peace
is still a blank shred of page
to be written

these laughing children
still have unbombed homes

these deafening cranes
building high rise
“little Dubai’s”
still do not drown out
the sound of the waves

i treasure this still-ness
and still vow
everyday
to make it
last

Fighting Words

Journal of the Communist Workers league

NO LITTLE GIRL RED IN GAZA | THE RIGHT TO HOPE | SHADES OF SILENCE | STILL-NESS

Poems by renowned Black leader and activist Julia Wright