Thank you, Poets

Thank you,  Poets

I thank you on behalf of all the children

Of  the world. Your children,

Your children for change.

//////

The voice of  the poet, I learned today,

Is stronger than  blades of  swords,  stronger than bombs

That send black ashes into our skies,

Stronger than men  and women, armed  with false promises.

/////

The voice of the poet, I learned today

Is stronger than Hate, Greed,  Destroyers

Of our  planet Earth.

So thank you poets for your voice today.

////

I will no longer need to ask,

What is love? What is Peace?

What is freedom?

/////

Thank you  poets, for  our planet,

For safe foods, pure air and water.

I will no longer need a dictionary or Google

To  define each word in our Constitution.

/////////////

I will be living them, because of you.

We will all hold hands and make visible

What it means to be one.

Thank you, Poets, for your poem for change.

    Frances Kakugawas from forthcoming book

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April is Poetry Month

            April

The poets, in droves

Lick their pens, salivating

Over metaphors, turning

Death into life. It must be

National Poetry Month.

            Poets for Peace

Each time a poet

Puts pen to paper,

There is a sliver of hope

For Peace.

            Voice from the Unborn

You promised me, eons ago,

 A world, free of battlefields, soldiers, children

Abandoned  in fear and hunger.

You offered me Hope, again and again.

A world, you said, where we will stand

Hand in hand, beyond  color, religion, gender, age,

 One race. One humanity.

You promised me a world

Free of poison in oceans, earth and air.

“You  are the future”, you told me,

“Come and be born in this world I will

Create  for  you.”

My brothers and sisters who believed you

Are now old men and women, and they wait.

They wait.

Listen to my voice, your unborn child.

Eons ago, you sliced the chrysanthemum

Off  its stalk and left it

Naked in the sun.

Over the ashes of Hiroshima,

Our victory was hailed.

Beneath that, my ancestors lay buried.

Stop using me, your unborn child

For promises and meaningless  rhetoric.

The future is now.  I can’t wait any longer.

The future is now.  I want to be  born.

Today.

   Frances  Kakugawa from What Kind of Ancestors Do You Want to Be by

U of Chicago Press. and from Dangerous Woman: Poetry for the Ageless, Watermark Publishing.

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