America

America

by Allen Ginsberg

America I've given you all and now I'm nothing.
America two dollars and twentyseven cents January
17, 1956.
I can't stand my own mind.
America when will we end the human war?
Go fuck yourself with your atom bomb.
I don't feel good don't bother me.
I won't write my poem till I'm in my right mind.
America when will you be angelic?
When will you take off your clothes?
When will you look at yourself through the grave?
When will you be worthy of your million Trotskyites?
America why are your libraries full of tears?
America when will you send your eggs to India?
I'm sick of your insane demands.
When can I go into the supermarket and buy what I
need with my good looks?
America after all it is you and I who are perfect not
the next world.
Your machinery is too much for me.
You made me want to be a saint.
There must be some other way to settle this argument.
Burroughs is in Tangiers I don't think he'll come back
it's sinister.
Are you being sinister or is this some form of practical
joke?
I'm trying to come to the point.
I refuse to give up my obsession.
America stop pushing I know what I'm doing.
America the plum blossoms are falling.
I haven't read the newspapers for months, everyday
somebody goes on trial for murder.
America I feel sentimental about the Wobblies.
America I used to be a communist when I was a kid
I'm not sorry.
I smoke marijuana every chance I get.
I sit in my house for days on end and stare at the roses
in the closet.
When I go to Chinatown I get drunk and never get laid.
My mind is made up there's going to be trouble.
You should have seen me reading Marx.
My psychoanalyst thinks I'm perfectly right.
I won't say the Lord's Prayer.
I have mystical visions and cosmic vibrations.
America I still haven't told you what you did to Uncle
Max after he came over from Russia.

I'm addressing you.
Are you going to let your emotional life be run by
Time Magazine?
I'm obsessed by Time Magazine.
I read it every week.
Its cover stares at me every time I slink past the corner
candystore.
I read it in the basement of the Berkeley Public Library.
It's always telling me about responsibility. Business-
men are serious. Movie producers are serious.
Everybody's serious but me.
It occurs to me that I am America.
I am talking to myself again.

Asia is rising against me.
I haven't got a chinaman's chance.
I'd better consider my national resources.
My national resources consist of two joints of
marijuana millions of genitals an unpublishable
private literature that goes 1400 miles an hour
and twenty-five-thousand mental institutions.
I say nothing about my prisons nor the millions of
underprivileged who live in my flowerpots
under the light of five hundred suns.
I have abolished the whorehouses of France, Tangiers
is the next to go.
My ambition is to be President despite the fact that
I'm a Catholic.
America how can I write a holy litany in your silly
mood?
I will continue like Henry Ford my strophes are as
individual as his automobiles more so they're
all different sexes.
America I will sell you strophes $2500 apiece $500
down on your old strophe
America free Tom Mooney
America save the Spanish Loyalists
America Sacco & Vanzetti must not die
America I am the Scottsboro boys.
America when I was seven momma took me to Com-
munist Cell meetings they sold us garbanzos a
handful per ticket a ticket costs a nickel and the
speeches were free everybody was angelic and
sentimental about the workers it was all so sin-
cere you have no idea what a good thing the
party was in 1835 Scott Nearing was a grand
old man a real mensch Mother Bloor made me
cry I once saw Israel Amter plain. Everybody
must have been a spy.
America you don't really want to go to war.
America it's them bad Russians.
Them Russians them Russians and them Chinamen.
And them Russians.
The Russia wants to eat us alive. The Russia's power
mad. She wants to take our cars from out our
garages.
Her wants to grab Chicago. Her needs a Red Readers'
Digest. Her wants our auto plants in Siberia.
Him big bureaucracy running our fillingsta-
tions.
That no good. Ugh. Him make Indians learn read.
Him need big black niggers. Hah. Her make us
all work sixteen hours a day. Help.
America this is quite serious.
America this is the impression I get from looking in
the television set.
America is this correct?
I'd better get right down to the job.
It's true I don't want to join the Army or turn lathes
in precision parts factories, I'm nearsighted and
psychopathic anyway.
America I'm putting my queer shoulder to the wheel.

Let's make a deal

Let's Make a Deal

by Diane Blue

You forgive me for liking you too much,

And I'll forgive you for not liking me enough.

You forgive me for missing you so,

And I'll forgive you for being so cold.

You forgive me for the loud racing of my heart,

And I'll forgive you for not hearing it.

You forgive me for playing your games,

And I'll forgive you for toying with my emotions.

You forgive me for finding you so attractive,

And I'll forgive you for not noticing.

You forgive me for raising you up so high,

And I'll forgive you for bringing me down so low.

You forgive me for wanting to be with you,

And I'll forgive you for avoiding me.

You forgive me for being so pathetic,

And I'll forgive you for taking advantage of it.

You forgive me for not being able to let go,

And I'll forgive you for never having latched on.

You forgive me for having hopes and dreams,

And I'll forgive you for crushing them.

Forgiveness brings inner peace.

Do we have a deal?

Silence

Silence

by Jessica Sills

As you sit in silence,

Wondering why

I'll be your shoulder to cry on

Until your tears run dry.

When you've been hurt,

And can't believe what they've done

If you need someone to talk to

I'll be the one.

If a close friend hurts you,

And you don't understand

Remember I'm here,

I'll lend a helping hand.

Burdens are lighter when carried by two,

And I just want you to know

I'm here for you.

Life is a prison

Life is a prison by Puff Life is a prison, Oh God let me out. No one to listen, To hear when you shout. Climb the walls of insanity, Ride the waves of despair. If you fall it don't matter, There's no one to care. Used to wish for a window, To see birds, trees and sky, But you're better without one - Stops you aiming too high. Watching freedom is painful, For those locked away. Seeing joy, love and happiness, Another price that you pay. Strong is good, weak is bad. Be it false, be it true. Your mind makes the choice, And enforces it too. Cell walls built by society, With rules to adhere. If you breach the acceptable, You had better beware. Hide the pain, carry on, Routine is the key. Don't let on that you're not, What you're pretending to be. Lock it all up inside you, How badly that bodes. Look out for that one day, When it all just explodes. Leaving naught but a shell, Base functionality too. But killing all else, That was uniquely you. So how do you grow, With a timebomb inside? Or how to defuse it, Without destroying its ride? You can't.

We wear the mask

We Wear the Mask

by Paul Laurence Dunbar

We wear the mask that grins and lies,


It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,--


This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,


And mouth with myriad subtleties.

Why should the world be overwise,


In counting all our tears and sighs?


Nay, let them only see us, while


We wear the mask.

We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries


To thee from tortured souls arise.


We sing, but oh the clay is vile


Beneath our feet, and long the mile;


But let the world dream otherwise,


We wear the mask!

We all wear masks. Its just apart of our nature to hide certain things from different people. We show how we want others to perceive us. This isn't deception, it is merely a tactic to save face. Smiles hide sorrow, laughs hide cries, joy hides pain. At the end of the day, the only person we are being 100% honest with is ourself. As we get closer to those in our lives, layers of the walls we have up come down, but the mask stays on always. Is it possible to fully remove it? Only when we look in the mirror do we see our true self.

No Tomorrow

No Tomorrow

by Angel Towe

I am going to die tomorrow,
But yet I haven't been born.
My mother shows no sorrow,
For I am a product of love torn.

I will never see the light of day,
I will never smell a flower,
I will never walk along a waters bay,
Or feel the drop of an Aprils shower.

It hurts for no one to show me love,
I will never be hugged or kissed,
When I have gone to the heavens above,
I wonder if I will be missed.

Today is my last day to live,
My last thought, my last breath.
Just think of all I could give,
But tomorrow I'll be put to rest.

I'm not sure how you feel about abortion and choice, (I'm not even sure how I feel) but this poem gets down to reality nonetheless. Without someone to ever love him/her, this poem touches the very soul of the controversial act of abortion by giving us the perspective of the child. Of course no one can speak for the child, but Angel Towe paints a picture of what she thinks is going on in the mind of a child that never gets the chance to live yet dies a sudden death. There are many things that we all debate about; whether pro-choice is right or pro-life. No matter the stance, there is still a baby that has no choice at all.

Unfiltered

There's this site called LiveLeak.com. It is a site filled with extraordinary videos that are unfiltered and not censored by anyone. It is a popular website that is famed from its uncut videos. Categories of videos include politics, middle east, celebrities, citizen journalism, etc. It is a viable resource for the latest news and issues as well as a site to see videos not found anywhere else.

What got me interested in this interesting site is the middle east section. This section mostly covers the violence going on in multiple countries in the middle east. There are videos coming from news sources, citizens, and even soldiers from all sides of the conflicts. Soldiers posting videos of their exploits and daily experiences gives the conflicts a new side to understand. By seeing what they see, the videos give the conflicts a new face as we see first hand the results of war. The victims of war are clearly portrayed, showing just how gruesome war is.

War is different when one only hears about it and sees videos of it through censored news sources. A clear picture is portrayed through newspapers and news channels. But when videos of the same conflict are posted and fully bypass the bias restrictions of the media, a new picture is painted.

In a way, a source of news like this is beneficial since all sides can be covered. It gives us the ability to view the conflict directly from the front lines. The other side has somewhat of a moral dilemma to it. Yes, it sheds light to the atrocities and is an outlet to see just how bad things get, but posting videos of people dying on tape creates an interesting topic. I wonder how the families of the dead feel that their deaths are on tape available for anyone to see. It brings up a moral issue and I'm not too sure how I feel about it. The Internet is a place for unbiased material, but where is the line drawn for the content of things posted. Is there a line for death? Not at the moment. So when is it too much?