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Jillian Jesser Nov 2015
shirelles
monday night
alone in a big house
light the candles
another one of my rituals
born one hour,
dead the next
to make room
for other
prayers
postures
pen tips
but the way candles
flicker in the sweet
soul
is not another ritual
warm life
to the tune of golden
notes
swimming through
once bleak
     once empty
once impure
       air
and suddenly, I am baptized
more than I ever was
in that sterile, dead
chlorine
    more than spent hymns
in drafty cathedrals
       so, the sound lives.


my bed would tilt
           at twelve years old
I'd wake
               startled of the
                       psychic death
spread like bodies after
            a paid for war
I'd scream like the cats
              fighting by the window
at my aunts house
               I would huddle with
my childhood
                     hiding from the puberty
that stalked me
like a jungle cat
               the mind reeled with
my spent pulse and
                 at night
                        under shamed
                   covers
                                 bitten fingertips
the white light
           on the street
                              looking on
it was the last day of winter
unseasonably warm

I was standing behind an Imam
his arms were raised
hurling prayers for peace
into the face of intransigence

black dressed armored
SWAT teams amassed
swinging readied M16s
vigilantly guarding walls
constricting penned citizens

waiting to place an
American flag
draped coffin
onto the growing pile
of other coffins
covered in the
multicolored flags of
Iraq War belligerents
swelling at the base
of the wrought iron fence
surrounding the White House

I saw a curtain in the
White House part
the window filled
with two tiny faces

I imagined it to be
Sasha and Bo
taking a break from
rambunctious play
to peer out on
a grim assembly

wondering
in confusion
whats going on?
why are these people
placing coffins
in front of our house?

Sasha and Bo
ran upstairs
to the
Oval Office

she burst through
the door

“Daddy people are
piling coffins
in front of our house

Why?”

The President
hugged his daughter
and answered…

“we’re at war
Sasha...

“the Evil Doers
hate us for
who we are...

“they want to
hurt us...

“we must ****
them…

Sasha asked…

“one sign says
our bombs
**** children…

is that true
Daddy?”
Thats a lie
right Daddy?

If you knew
children like
me were being
killed you wouldn't
let that continue…
would you Daddy?”

John Kerry
popped his head
into the office….

“Sasha,
your Daddy
would never
**** children
in service to a lie”

Sasha’s head tilted…
The President flashed a smile…
John Kerry walked away whistling…
giving no notice to the photo of the
Vietnam War Memorial
as he passed

Music Selection:
The Shirelles
Soldier Boy

Oakland
6/11/14
jbm
Liliana Lopez Dec 2018
I first saw it a month before he died,
When we took my father on
A drive through his high school town.
Thornton
We listened to the Shirelles
On the way, driving through vineyards
And dusty dirt roads. In Thornton,
Grapevines wither because it is cold,
The December ice too fresh, too biting
For their youthful leaves, and they die,
Brokenhearted for the flight of youth and sun.
Jillian Jesser Oct 2018
shirelles
monday night
alone in a big house
light the candles
another one of my rituals
born one hour,
dead the next
to make room
for other
prayers
postures
pen tips
but the way candles
flicker in the sweet
soul
is not another ritual
warm life
to the tune of golden
notes
swimming through
once bleak
     once empty
once impure
       air
and suddenly, I am baptized
more than I ever was
in that sterile, dead
chlorine
    more than spent hymns
in drafty cathedrals
       so, the sound lives.


my bed would tilt
           at twelve years old
I'd wake
               startled of the
                       psychic death
spread like bodies after
            a paid for war
I'd scream like the cats
              fighting by the window
at my aunts house
               I would huddle with
my childhood
                     hiding from the puberty
that stalked me
like a jungle cat
               the mind reeled with
my spent pulse and
                 at night
                        under shamed
                   covers
                                 bitten fingertips
the white light
           on the street
                              looking on

— The End —