Poets Against War continues the tradition of socially engaged poetry by creating venues for poetry as a voice against war, tyranny and oppression.

Karren Alenier

Karren LaLonde Alenier is author of five collections of poetry, including "Looking for Divine Transportation," winner of the 2002 Towson University Prize for Literature. Her poetry and fiction have been published in such magazines as: the MISSISSIPPI REVIEW, JEWISH CURRENTS, and POET LORE. She is working with composer William Banfield and New York City’s Encompass New Opera Theatre artistic director Nancy Rhodes on the opera "Gertrude Stein Invents a Jump Early On," based on her verse play by the same name. She is president of The Word Works, a Washington, D.C., based literary organization that sponsors the Washington Prize.

The War Against Death

The emperor of the Qin
dynasty pursued life ever
enduring,  
          dispersed emissaries
to commandeer the elixir
of immortality.  
                Sooth-
sayers decreed, “to be a true
man, one who would never
die, one who could fly
through clouds and air,
the emperor must guard his
whereabouts.”
              So he became a
ghost floating through secret
passages in his palace, ordering
the death of any subject who slipped
and said, “I saw him in the garden. I
saw him in his chambers.”
                         Just in case,
he assembled all the potters of his empire
to form and fire a terra-cotta army,
                                     generals
six feet tall, horses in full battle
dress, one thousand foot
soldiers—every one
a unique face,
               bowmen with working weapons.
If he had to go into the unknown to wage
this battle, he would not depart alone.

published in LOOKING FOR DIVINE TRANSPORTATION  (The Bunny and the Crocodile Press)

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