These are poems dedicated to the children of Ukraine and their mothers, fathers and extended families. And to the brave Ukrainian soldiers, male and female, who guard them and preserve their freedom.
Remembering Pete Reed today, an American hero among many in this Russo-Ukrainian War. His widow Alex Potter did an interview with TGM: “Pete was so gregarious, you know. He was loud and proud and wild, and I think part of that was his personality He definitely knew how to lead and how to take charge of people, which was both amazing for our medical work — and very attractive to me. He had like a heart of gold underneath. And it wasn't just in the field.” 💪💙 Full story: https://tinyurl.com/ydc9wpef
Yes, and having men (or whatever they are) in power like Trump and Putin makes the body parts of no concern. Has either ever given their actions a second thought?
Obama, Biden, and Clinton have to bear significant responsibility for Putin's push into Ukraine.since the Clinton days NATO violated it's diplomatic understanding regarding their proximity to the Russian borders. Clinton loyalists, e.g., Nuland, engineered a Ukraine coup accompanied by a false flag front. Nuland's phone call regarding the coup and the State Dept's role in it and preferences for a new government was interception and has been played and transcribed numerous times. Since those days Ukraine has been used as a US proxy and cash cow for money skimming and laundering operations which have benefitted the Bidens, the Clinton's, Zelensky and his circle, and, of course, Putin. Who knows what shape this new mining. Agreement will take, especially since part of the motherhood is on Russian controlled turf. To quote Perot, I think that the directors for the .icing will generate a great sucking sound.
What I wonder is how they all manage to stay awake and functional thru this everlasting horror show that Putin has inflicted on his next door neighbor and the world. "The aim of all war is robbery" incisively wrote Voltaire. Putin obviously made a calculation and decided to go a-thieving. His trump card is nuclear weapons, the saber he keeps rattling. Nato at his border, wish for a buffer state, may figure in at some level but I'm sticking with Voltaire. The immediate cause of the horror show is Putin, so I'm happy pinning it all on him, and equally happy letting Voltaire name his motive.
When I look at it I'm reminded of Ugolino Gherardesca, whose children, as they starved in the Archbishop's keep, begged their starving father to eat their corpses. That's filial piety, and, unfortunately, the grand guignol comedy we get in a war run by comedy, dementia, and ruthlessness.
Russia is a very resource rich country, but i guess a necessary concomitant of wealth is that there is never enough of it. Witness the rare metals deal which will make the U.S. Directors both wealthy and powerful -- as if they were not already so.
The first aggression was the U.S. State Dept. Overthrow of a legally elected govmnt. A notorious state dept. Call was intercepted and has been broadcast and transcribed. It contains such tidbits as U.S. picks to run the successor regime. An interesting fact in this non-negotiation was that the Ukrainians signed onto a finance package that offered much less favorable terms than had been in the Russian package which was, for the benefit of US business and intelligence interests, being discarded.
Curiously, while half the population subsequently expatriated, and the 18-25 show little enthusiasm for the war, the flow of U.S. war funds and machinery have proven stubbornly resistant to audit. The two fining links in the great patriotic chain are the financial aggrandizement of Zelensky's circle, murky cash transfers to the Bidens, and reports of armaments showing up on the international black market.
So I don't splash my sacred paint on any of the soiled panels of International Diplomacy's Triptych, The Garden of Earthly Frights.
Note in a Morgue Ashtray
Here is grief that reason can't assuage:
These died for dried ink on a ledger's page.
********
Beyond the Sea of Azov
...Crasso
Dilci, che 'l sai: di che sapore è l'oro?
I wonder if sunflowers, their blossoms bright
And golden, still sway and bend out there along
Bombed ruts, where old and young convulse in fright?
I have no heart for tropes of right and wrong:
The seasons change, money changers grow rich.
Their war is a cash cow. They weigh out the dung.
There are silver dollars in every ditch,
Where, folded in the wings of Beelzebub,
In fetor that makes the entrails roll and pitch,
The dead collide like logjams in a flood,
And all across hot scars of abscessed lands,
The Hogs of War scream and lap up fresh blood,
While pimps and priests extend their greedy hands,
And count their paper clips and rubber bands.
******
In a 2023 poll 78% of the Ukrainian population believed their government is corrupt, and their president responsible for the corruption. 70% of young adults expressed these sentiments, as did 81% of persons sixty and over.
Conscription is unpopular among the citizenry, and between 40% and 50% of the population has left the country. Substantial skims are reported on arms shipments and construction contracts, and at least one expediter is a close adviser of the president.
L'oro, yes. Plutarch particularly despised greed, the perpetual craving for huger piles of moolah at anyone's expense and no matter how devastating to others' lives be the actions taken by greedheads to amplify their already bloated fortunes. Perseus I think it was, was so in love with money he couldn't part with it even to win a war and keep his army paid and well-outfitted. As I recall he lost, and if so it served him right.
The gist of your comment seems in line with Plutarch, i.e., that wherever there's a chance of obtaining more lucre greedheads will dive in and help themselves to any amount of it they can. Everything to them is just plunder for personal gain. They are indifferent to the grief it causes others. I can think of many exomples that reinforce the point.
In the US especially greed is the ruling vice of the whole system. Pity is banned from the picture or any sharing with everyone else for the common good.
All I can think to add is that every living person is a conscript and every dead one was. At birth, you are a draftee. Life is nonstop struggle throughout in a futile battle that is certain to be lost. But it is particularly disgusting to me that greedheads think only of increasing their wealth even when people's lives and bodies are being torn apart ferociously, the way they are in Ukraine. Brotherly love? Very few are motivated by compassion or pity.
I believe the root of the Ukraine war is greed and insensitivity to human suffering. Trump backs Putin because Trump is greed incarnate and insensitive to anyone else's suffering. Other American presidents made mistakes, but no one other than Trump sided with Putin and fawned over him.
What wonderful poems Michael. I think you captured the atmosphere of suffering and resilience. Thank you.
Thanks Rolando, as a longtime peace activist, I think we should all do what we can.
I'm a poet, so I write and translate.
Remembering Pete Reed today, an American hero among many in this Russo-Ukrainian War. His widow Alex Potter did an interview with TGM: “Pete was so gregarious, you know. He was loud and proud and wild, and I think part of that was his personality He definitely knew how to lead and how to take charge of people, which was both amazing for our medical work — and very attractive to me. He had like a heart of gold underneath. And it wasn't just in the field.” 💪💙 Full story: https://tinyurl.com/ydc9wpef
So many heroes dead, and so many children and their mothers, thanks to one monster, Putin.
And Trump is his biggest fan.
For God and Country
The weapons and the cash keep pouring in:
The body parts are payment for the skim.
Yes, and having men (or whatever they are) in power like Trump and Putin makes the body parts of no concern. Has either ever given their actions a second thought?
Obama, Biden, and Clinton have to bear significant responsibility for Putin's push into Ukraine.since the Clinton days NATO violated it's diplomatic understanding regarding their proximity to the Russian borders. Clinton loyalists, e.g., Nuland, engineered a Ukraine coup accompanied by a false flag front. Nuland's phone call regarding the coup and the State Dept's role in it and preferences for a new government was interception and has been played and transcribed numerous times. Since those days Ukraine has been used as a US proxy and cash cow for money skimming and laundering operations which have benefitted the Bidens, the Clinton's, Zelensky and his circle, and, of course, Putin. Who knows what shape this new mining. Agreement will take, especially since part of the motherhood is on Russian controlled turf. To quote Perot, I think that the directors for the .icing will generate a great sucking sound.
There is plenty of blame to go around, but no American president has praised and fawned over Putin like Trump.
What I wonder is how they all manage to stay awake and functional thru this everlasting horror show that Putin has inflicted on his next door neighbor and the world. "The aim of all war is robbery" incisively wrote Voltaire. Putin obviously made a calculation and decided to go a-thieving. His trump card is nuclear weapons, the saber he keeps rattling. Nato at his border, wish for a buffer state, may figure in at some level but I'm sticking with Voltaire. The immediate cause of the horror show is Putin, so I'm happy pinning it all on him, and equally happy letting Voltaire name his motive.
I think our friend Voltaire hit the nail on the head.
When I look at it I'm reminded of Ugolino Gherardesca, whose children, as they starved in the Archbishop's keep, begged their starving father to eat their corpses. That's filial piety, and, unfortunately, the grand guignol comedy we get in a war run by comedy, dementia, and ruthlessness.
Russia is a very resource rich country, but i guess a necessary concomitant of wealth is that there is never enough of it. Witness the rare metals deal which will make the U.S. Directors both wealthy and powerful -- as if they were not already so.
The first aggression was the U.S. State Dept. Overthrow of a legally elected govmnt. A notorious state dept. Call was intercepted and has been broadcast and transcribed. It contains such tidbits as U.S. picks to run the successor regime. An interesting fact in this non-negotiation was that the Ukrainians signed onto a finance package that offered much less favorable terms than had been in the Russian package which was, for the benefit of US business and intelligence interests, being discarded.
Curiously, while half the population subsequently expatriated, and the 18-25 show little enthusiasm for the war, the flow of U.S. war funds and machinery have proven stubbornly resistant to audit. The two fining links in the great patriotic chain are the financial aggrandizement of Zelensky's circle, murky cash transfers to the Bidens, and reports of armaments showing up on the international black market.
So I don't splash my sacred paint on any of the soiled panels of International Diplomacy's Triptych, The Garden of Earthly Frights.
Note in a Morgue Ashtray
Here is grief that reason can't assuage:
These died for dried ink on a ledger's page.
********
Beyond the Sea of Azov
...Crasso
Dilci, che 'l sai: di che sapore è l'oro?
I wonder if sunflowers, their blossoms bright
And golden, still sway and bend out there along
Bombed ruts, where old and young convulse in fright?
I have no heart for tropes of right and wrong:
The seasons change, money changers grow rich.
Their war is a cash cow. They weigh out the dung.
There are silver dollars in every ditch,
Where, folded in the wings of Beelzebub,
In fetor that makes the entrails roll and pitch,
The dead collide like logjams in a flood,
And all across hot scars of abscessed lands,
The Hogs of War scream and lap up fresh blood,
While pimps and priests extend their greedy hands,
And count their paper clips and rubber bands.
******
In a 2023 poll 78% of the Ukrainian population believed their government is corrupt, and their president responsible for the corruption. 70% of young adults expressed these sentiments, as did 81% of persons sixty and over.
Conscription is unpopular among the citizenry, and between 40% and 50% of the population has left the country. Substantial skims are reported on arms shipments and construction contracts, and at least one expediter is a close adviser of the president.
L'oro, yes. Plutarch particularly despised greed, the perpetual craving for huger piles of moolah at anyone's expense and no matter how devastating to others' lives be the actions taken by greedheads to amplify their already bloated fortunes. Perseus I think it was, was so in love with money he couldn't part with it even to win a war and keep his army paid and well-outfitted. As I recall he lost, and if so it served him right.
The gist of your comment seems in line with Plutarch, i.e., that wherever there's a chance of obtaining more lucre greedheads will dive in and help themselves to any amount of it they can. Everything to them is just plunder for personal gain. They are indifferent to the grief it causes others. I can think of many exomples that reinforce the point.
In the US especially greed is the ruling vice of the whole system. Pity is banned from the picture or any sharing with everyone else for the common good.
All I can think to add is that every living person is a conscript and every dead one was. At birth, you are a draftee. Life is nonstop struggle throughout in a futile battle that is certain to be lost. But it is particularly disgusting to me that greedheads think only of increasing their wealth even when people's lives and bodies are being torn apart ferociously, the way they are in Ukraine. Brotherly love? Very few are motivated by compassion or pity.
I believe the root of the Ukraine war is greed and insensitivity to human suffering. Trump backs Putin because Trump is greed incarnate and insensitive to anyone else's suffering. Other American presidents made mistakes, but no one other than Trump sided with Putin and fawned over him.