The bit of doggerel which follows got typed while in a sort of fiendish rant mode. The
Goddess made me do it. It is a meditation on, at least partially, an
item in the Asia Times,
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GG07Ak02.html
which reads in part,
"AMMAN, Jordan - A remarkable proportion of the violence taking place in
Iraq is regularly credited to the Jordanian Ahmad al-Khalayleh, better
known as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and his al-Qaeda-linked organization in
Iraq. Sometimes it seems no car bomb goes off, no ambush occurs that
isn't claimed in his name or attributed to him by the Bush
administration. Bush and his top officials have, in fact, made good use
of him, lifting his reputed feats of terrorism to epic, even mythic,
proportions (much aided by various mainstream media outlets). Given that
the invasion and occupation of Iraq have now been proven beyond a shadow
of a doubt to be based on administration lies and manipulations, I begun
to wonder if the vaunted Zarqawi even existed."
- etc -
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Zarqawi stands so very tall
you cannot see his face at all
Yet neocons will oft declare
his face has been seen everywhere
His webpages which you may have missed
are at sites which no longer exist
His soldeirs made a new one yesterday
To scare the neocons, and to play.
He visits a mullah, so we've heard
who tells him the Almighty's Word
He then knows just the instant to jump
All the way from Kabul, onto Paul Bremer's rump
In the battle which then ensues
he escapes again, he's slipped the noose,
Karl Rove can then proclaim with glee,
"Look There, Not Here, - That's the real enemy!"
And we in front of our televisions stare
We are shocked and awed and glad we're not there,
And our soldiers who are there are not at their ease
They see Zarqawi in the trees
and in the bazaars and mosques and libraries
They'll see him in nightmares and while popping cherries
They'll have to come home soon and tell us how they
all captured Zarqawi, on a thousand different days.
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- adapted from a children's poem, "The Microbe", from Hiliare Belloc,
approx. 1898.
OK, so the reference to poor Paul Bremer, who got chased out two days
early, is by now a bit dated. Lots of Americans may by now have
forgotten him, but I bet the Iraqi people haven't !
By all available means, Pass It On !
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He rode easy in a Lexus, he was bloated and fat
You could tell from his face he was just a doormat
But people did what he said, and gave him their last dime
Because they'd been told he was tough on crime
When he walked he jiggled and when he spoke he bubbled
In the past year his salary had more than doubled
He had thousands of jobs sent overseas
Americans were expensive, he so hired Chinese
He was rich as Croesus but he talked like a bum
there was moldy bread for the workers, while he drank strong rum
I got to start that war on terror
But I can't start it by myself
Can't I just provoke the Jews and the Arabs ?
If I can fool them, it will start itself !
If you ever thought this fashionable fool
Would ever fund research, or a clinic, or a school
You'd give that notion up on the day
You looked at the land where his company had their way.
Where once were libraries, now are burnt-out shells
Where once were mosques, are now smoking hells
broken glass and bloodstains are all you'll find there,
make sure the Americans stay too fat to care.
Americans still think corporations bring peace,
Americans still think they can have cheap grease,
and Bibles and Barbie dolls and a few other things,
They've never seen the death which this policy brings.
I got to start that war on terror
But I can't start it by myself
I wonder if I can scare the Chechens and the Cossacks ?
If I can provoke them, it will start itself !
The people stand like rocks, they have seen this before,
Their grandfathers murdered in senseless war,
They march and hold banners for all to see,
"I won't bomb you, just don't poison me."
But I got to start that war on terror
and I can't pay for it by myself
I wonder if I can charge everyone's great-grand-kids ?
If I can rob them, it will start itself !
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Respectfully Adapted
from Johnny Cash's "The Reverend Mr. Black"
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I came from the City of New Orleans,
All the way to Baghdad by plane and ship and jeep
A thousand days and two thousand of my buddies,
Will never come back, they've gone to their eternal sleep .
All through the sand-bound odyssey
My brother writes me from Tennessee
"We're with you man, you must have nerves of steel.
We'll rebuild the Towers and we'll rebuild our pride,
Our enemies will be swept aside
You've made that Saddam vanish beneath Fate's wheel."
Good morning Mister Chalabi, how are you?
Don't you know us, we're the native sons,
Of the land where glows the City of New Orleans,
We can go anywhere we like, and we don't need guns.
Dealing card games were some old men in a club car,
Old, and rich, and by choice quite obscure.
Pass the little disk that holds the contracts
Feel the safety and the bloat of the stone-heart entreprenuer.
And the sons of poor corn farmers
And the sons of engineers
Live in their father's wondrous dry-well of dirt and steel.
Mothers rock their babes asleep,
Don't worry 'bout the levees, they'll surely keep,
The pumps, and the Army, will always keep it real.
Good Morning, Mister al-Sadr, how are you ?
Don't you know us, we're the native sons
Of the men who drained the swamps and built the dynamos
Baghdad will look like New Orleans by the time we're done.
Nighttime in the City of New Orleans,
The Gods sent a storm, and washed most of it away.
I know this from the mail I got this morning
They laugh at us here, and I hardly know what to say.
Over here the towns and people seem
To enjoy what for us would be a bad dream,
And their mullahs barely care about this news.
The insurgent sings his song again,
Reporters, will you please refrain
From going outside, and may we please borrow your shoes ?
Good night, Mister Allawi, how are you?
Don't you know us, we're the native sons,
Who could have saved the City of New Orleans,
It will have sunk five hundred miles before this war is done.
- adpted from Steve Goodman's "City of New Orleans" (1970)
- the song you've probably heard performed by Arlo Guthrie.
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It was many and many a year ago,
O let us be never in error !
That Dick Cheney dreamt of a Righteous War
He would call it the War on Terror.
And Dick Cheney lived with no other thought
Than to start the War on Terror.
He was a child and Dubya was a child,
O let us be never in error !
And they planned with plans that were nobler than plans
For their Righteous War on Terror.
With plans which named the gods of heaven
In their Righteous War on Terror.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
O let us be never in error !
Two airplanes came out of the sky,
killing three thousand from my country.
And most of our highborn Senators
came to be duped and stricken with terror
They thought it was Arabs and Kurdish and Pashto
Who had started the War on Terror.
The Ku Klux Klan were now happy and bloated,
O let us be never in error !
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
for this hideous "war on terror")
They'd destroy our army, and destroy the Jews,
With their Righteous War on Terror.
But our love it was stronger by far than the hate
O let us be never in error !
Of many far richer than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever forget the souls of three thousand
Who were murdered in my country.
For the moon never beams without bringing back dreams
O let us be never in error !
And the stars never rise but our soldiers despise
they who started the War on Terror;
And so, the neocons must wail in their cells,
Their sobs shot through with curses and yells,
Since they lost the War on Terror,
Their beautiful War on Terror.
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- adapted from Edgar Allan Poe's
"Annabel Lee" (1845)
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