news reports

dariush guest blogger spends too much time today on his own reading news reports and gets some bad news from friends:

1.

i can sit in a room with trees and a window

reports are coming in

through the green shutters

breeze calling arrows of geese

chasing the summer north

north across frontiers

forest and trails of

satellite phones

calling down death delivery

you drag the bodies back across the border

you hide the bodies in the woods

my friend calls me

says they came with a lot of guns

last night

now she's lost her home

i should have been there

there wasn't anything i could do

when they come with guns

we have to swallow

but we should swallow it together

now they say there is a trail

that goes somewhere through caracas

they allege

all the way down here to rio

they allege

with these swift allegations

that fly in advance of bombs

that precipitate bullets

i don't care what they allege

they can swallow their allegations

i don't care what's true or false

everything's so tangled up anyway

just they should come here themselves

all together

unnamed security officials

diplomats with many years experience

military police colonels

investigative journalists

writing in left of centre newspapers

they should come here where my friends live

and spread themselves out

link hands

lie down

spread themselves out

like manure on the road

public works

and let them swallow the bullets this time

let's all swallow

all together

i can sit in a room

reports are coming in

2.

it doesn't matter who we elegise

we all die the same time

the same death is our death

if i take the name of a man

i scrawl on a wall

saudades

when i hear about death i just want

to sleep

to sleep very deep

even though i have so much work to do

reports are coming in

someone needs to note them

or we'll all get lost in it

you were very young

you were very old

it doesn't matter

i feel sick to see your name

3.

you are waiting for a call

that might give you hope

you can't solve for yourself

where you turn next

you have to pick yourself up

but you have no lever

too much weight

this is how it is

when you face power

it can't be questioned

because power makes a man

no more a man

he becomes a weight

a god is iron

a man turns into iron

his face is too distant

to have eyes

he has iron legs

and iron hands

he can't cup his hands

or blink his eyes

or will his legs

i hope i never

have power

to kill

4. an old conclusion

the world outside has nothing to offer us

it's all the same if you go

in a line all around the world

crossing many countries

you'll find everything is made of the same stuff

called matter

which it doesn't

there are squares made out of walls

white or red coloured, depending

and with roofs on top where people

squat

and mouths that open under hills

tunnels

made by tongues of green sea

salt

for all its colours

the colour of the world

is predominantly yellow

the yellow of old skin

there are stars but

even if you follow the stars

you don't find nothing new