Poets Against War continues the tradition of socially engaged poetry by creating venues for poetry as a voice against war, tyranny and oppression.
Laura Tattoo
52 years old
Laura Tattoo has been writing poetry most of her life. Born in Astoria, Queens, NY, Laura retired to Astoria, Oregon in 2001 after becoming disabled with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome. She won the Nina Mae Kellogg Award as best senior English student at Portland State University in 1983. With early influences of Dr. Seuss, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Shakespeare and a great love of fiction, Laura's poetic themes cover the gamut of women's experiences. She writes in English and French and publishes her current poems on her blog, Moineau en France. (http://moineauenfrance.blogspot.com)
Iraq Haiku Series I-V
I. Iraqi
from the time they came these bloodless soldiers nothing was ever the same
greed starts wars and kills à table drinking their fill we lost our children
haliburton first then a vast global empire drank iraqi blood
iraq is undone women weeping blood for years lost generation
do not turn away! it is our home and our blood help us to rebuild
II. American Soldier
here at this check point i stop each car with raised gun women and children
i can't speak the tongue what the hell does this man want? he's waving his arms
we get tips at night of terrorist insurgents take no prisoners!
we put hoods on them to keep them quiet, i scream shut up and listen!
stop i said stop stop! but none of them understood i had no options
second iraq deployment where else would i go? what else do i know?
you get used to it: four thousand brothers have died i must stop whining
III. Female Soldier
why won't he leave me always there licking his lips like an animal
i wanted to serve am i just a vagina? am i just a girl?
who will save me now that i'm meat for the slaughter? who will watch my back?
i ought to report how he stalks me everywhere yet i'm too afraid
he's got lots of friends they laugh when i walk past them captain, will you care?
captain, my captain i don't feel safe anymore i'm in two war zones
IV. Refugee
i am in jordan but i am not jordanese rights are limited
there are but six left my husband is dead so are his and my parents
my children buy bread they beg on the road i'm afraid to leave this room
it is i and five and each one hungry today i will try harder
i will wait in line with ten thousand iraqis and ask them nicely
other young widows line the marketplace we hope for coins, in'sh allah
i want to go home to my relatives still scattered like desert palms
i am alive but i just want to die to lie beside my husband
it is night in Amman a cool noiseless breeze blows through cut-out windows
maybe there is hope perhaps a letter comes from loved ones in basra
i will wait and watch soon we will return i have promised my children
V. Child Martyr
I am floating now above the wreckage i am free to come and go
mother is at home she is making our couscous she breathes in its steam
sister is sewing a tattered pant's cuff from my brother's hand-me-downs
i am the baby the one coddled tight the light in everyone's heart
mountains rise and rivers flow cities are spilling with cars and people
i do not feel pain as i float past you i am beyond all pain now
my white-red garments fall down to the ground i am a naked angel
my mother adds salt and raisins to the couscous sister is singing
brother runs to me or what was once me but i'm free to come and go
i bend my two arms into a breaststroke i dive headlong into sky
pure iraqi sky where prayers rise up like the sweet steam of couscous
