cleanskin/lilywhite
Police terms for a person who has no connection to terrorism
They carried rucksacks into King’s Cross,
these clean boys, these untouched boys,
these led astray men.
When shoplifting is no longer a thrill,
turn your attention to heaven,
the gold and riches and gaping legs of girls
all waiting on the other side of the big bang,
perverted promises, brainwashing.
Set aside chemistry, childrearing and cricket,
these false prophets, these western sirens.
All you need is to dirty yourself once.
Your names, although hard to pronounce,
will be on every television,
go down in history with your fellow
passengers, just on their way to work,
their flesh the only barrier to your reward.
Proud of your brown skin,
now they call you lilywhite,
what’s left of you,
splattered on a tube carriage wall,
flung hot-baked from bus to building,
not rising through big holes,
your planned escape hatches,
but just residue left to scatter
in the wind over Tavistock Square
or down the tunnel to Edgware Road,
not heavy enough to rise to heaven.
You’ll settle into gutters,
like the ones you tried to escape in Leeds,
the promises of Allah just ashes.
Police terms for a person who has no connection to terrorism
They carried rucksacks into King’s Cross,
these clean boys, these untouched boys,
these led astray men.
When shoplifting is no longer a thrill,
turn your attention to heaven,
the gold and riches and gaping legs of girls
all waiting on the other side of the big bang,
perverted promises, brainwashing.
Set aside chemistry, childrearing and cricket,
these false prophets, these western sirens.
All you need is to dirty yourself once.
Your names, although hard to pronounce,
will be on every television,
go down in history with your fellow
passengers, just on their way to work,
their flesh the only barrier to your reward.
Proud of your brown skin,
now they call you lilywhite,
what’s left of you,
splattered on a tube carriage wall,
flung hot-baked from bus to building,
not rising through big holes,
your planned escape hatches,
but just residue left to scatter
in the wind over Tavistock Square
or down the tunnel to Edgware Road,
not heavy enough to rise to heaven.
You’ll settle into gutters,
like the ones you tried to escape in Leeds,
the promises of Allah just ashes.
Comments
Yes, losers. Murderers are losers. And mass murderers are losers losers. And mass-movement bandwagoneers (who often gleefully or obediently committ murder) are self-loathing losers who try to exchange identity for Cause, self-worth for "greater worth."
I doubt many blombers are religiously motivated, actually. That may be the shirt they wear, but it's all desperate expression or easy immolation from Self underneath.
Too bad these losers (whoever they are - be they real terrorists or mercenary goons for power moves or copycats or secret-government operatives) take other folks with them in their inglorious, bloody tantrums.
Of course, more consolidation of gov. power and intrusion is streamlined. Big Brother here and especially abroad is skatin' on greased rails. Works EVERY time...
Again, let us pity those who died in this messy whatever-it-was. They didn't deserve to get caught up in LOSERS' deaths.
-D.
Of course this poem is a first draft. It's already changing as more about the bombers emerge. I had an email asking about the title of the poem. It's a police term for someone who has never been connected to terrorism.
Focusing on the police term and the colors, etc., was clever.
For example: Are you really seeing things through the bombers' eyes? Compare Muslim ablutions with "cleanskin" and white Westerners' perception of Muslims as all being Middle Eastern brown folks.
This could be far more effective if you told it from both sides.
May I recommend Turner Cassity's "WTC" in No Second Eden, I think it is?
1) Remove all your linebreaks and see what you get (and where that takes you).
2) Consider changing the third-person reference to second-person to conform with the rest of the poem's more direct address.
R.