This is your reality, the brave new world;
i just hang out here:
birthed in the Cradle of Elam,
a mourning son of Baal,
smeared and anointed
with the oil from the
***** fingerprints of
countless scores of
sweaty neophytes;
carried, dropped, dented;
brought forth from eons passed,
updated for the 21st century,
gilded Krylon-gold.

This nebulous gift,
made tangible and
whole by blood,
a form fitting sacrifice,
transmogrified kudzu,
rootless, digging
talons' clutch into
our minds' construct,
seeks strength of
conviction, action.

Our ship is now
veering off course.
i must respond in kind.
i will not be led astray.
i will not have my good
intentions commandeered.
i will hijack your purpose,
screaming mutiny,
holding Occam's Razor-knife
to the throat of your jihads.

i issue a fatwa of peace,
as you once did,
before.

i renounce a kingdom of hate,
as you once did,
before.

i seek charity in effort,
as we once did,
before.

Let us rebuild.
Let us move forward.
***** a new Babel,
forsaking the sword.

Let our forks be on roads,
and not on our tongues;
a forging of union,
as we'd once begun:

My sisters, my brothers,
my family,
as one.

By: Cedric McClester

Muslims killing Muslims
Is Scripturally banned
So who wrote the fatwa
That says that you can
**** fellow Muslims
In another’s land
Across your border
In the desert sand

Bombing the Houthis
With wild abandon
With no regards, for
What target they land on
Like a school bus
Full of small children
Won’t bring your war
To a quick end

It’s time the Saudis
Come clean and confess
Their Crown Prince
Has created a mess
I’m talking about
His highness MBS
Their rising star
Who’s clearly much less

Killing a journalist
For telling the truth
Then attempting to manipulate
The clear-cut proof
Trying to play it off
Like some sort of spoof
He must not realize
That he’s not bulletproof



Cedric McClester, Copyright © 2018.  All rights reserved.

On this cold November night
Salman Rushdie shook my hand.
An irate Ayatollah had
pronounced a fatwa on the
man

He seemed at peace, this hirsute fellow.
in his bespoke suit from Savile Row.
He signed some copies of his book
then his security man said he must go..

The lecture hall had been half full.
Perhaps some had been scared away.
I had come to hear him speak.
Freedom of speech must rule the day.

Outside  Colden in the dark
an amphitheater is tucked away
A stage sunk in a bowl of grass
where Greek tragedies  might be played.

Which tradition shall prevail?
I wondered to myself that day.
Will acolytes of a murderous cult
Sweep Euripides away?

A Moslem horde  poured through the gates
when Rome fell  for the second time.
The Divine Wisdom was defiled
and Constantine Palaeologus died.

I turn my collar against the damp
illumined by sodium vapor light
I think on Arnold's loss of faith
and ignorant armies that struggle in the
night

On we drone,
Another day,
Another death,
We fly on high,
All day,
All night,
We never tire.
We've got the time,
Until we fire,
And we're assured,
It's not a crime.
It's more or less
A righteous act,
Our work,
That is.
We're told in fact,
That when we ****,
It's been approved,
Approved on high,
It couldn't be a
A crime of war.
Death comes right from
A **** List,
Like a – Fatwa,
If you will.
And should you happen
In the way,
It was just your time,
Not a crime,
Just your time.

Merry What?
Did I hear you right?
In this day
You have the audacity
To wish me
What?
Haven't you been paying attention?
You must have been out of the country.
You can't be serious.
It's Holidays or Seasons.
A fatwa has been proclaimed;
A jihad has been called,
The synagogue curtain is torn,
Graves open when that word's spoken.
We don't start the day
With The Lord's Prayer,
And you think you
Can get away
With wishing someone
A Merry Christmas?
HOHOHO LOL.

Salman Rushdie was given a fatwa death threat
For writing The Satanic Verses

He says he does not believe in God
Or a heaven or hell after death.

He is literary, not religious.

But he also says
That when he writes
He has to use words like soul
And that there is something
Religion-like in the use of his imagination
To create believable fictional worlds.

And that he is struck
When in the UK
By the beauty of old cathedrals and churches.

He talks of future religion
As being in religion
But in a different way.

       My my, Xie xie