Jungle Drums © 1996 Doris Flueck

 
.................................
Portrait from Amherst, Massachusetts
.................................

Only the top-volume static of the car's radio
had shattered the fragile calm.

A woman screamed as the shelling
had begun anew.
She screamed from Ras Beirut,
her head pressed in horror
against the car window, fists balled-up
striking at invisible enemies
in the air. She screamed.

Surrounded by the Berkshires,
by velvety Autumn's elegant disapproval,
screams end as abruptly
as they begin. No explosions, no impacts occur
to upset the isolation of a winding residential road in
the most peaceful of forests.
Only the top-volume static of the car's radio
had shattered the fragile nerves.
Threads of civility re-sewn, she straightened
her sensible brown skirt, smoothed
her sensible brown hair (vague grey strands
shyly peeping out here and there)
as her face regained its
familiar Rubens' ruddiness.

Forced to return to New England's sleepy stoicism
after the destruction of home,
haunted by a loss of dreams, I know
she is unable to sleep
beyond four o'clock a.m.
Sometimes not even past three.

Starting the car again, she grimaced in sheepish
apology and explained that
only in safety, when bombs
no longer fall out of the sky
and threaten one's children
can one afford the luxury
of panic.

We drove on, unspoken acceptance
between us -- we do not mention this incident to
the sons. Later as we reached the train station,
she smiled matter-of-factly
and said
and I quote

we need the young people
we need their enthusiasm for
when you reach my age you realize
there is nothing anyone can do.

She was only fifty-one.
Listen closely, she is still screaming.

 
.................................
The French Foreign Minister, Lebanon, April 1996
.................................

At first the old woman
came to praise not to bury
him & his countrymen
& to thank him
clutching his arm with her
withered fingers
her thin gnarled old arms
draped in tattered black
her gums smiling where her
teeth might have shown, once

but then the crone said
she said
the dogs came out
at night
after the massacre
they ate
they ate
the stray human fingers
left on the ground
they ate
they ate
amid the wreckage
the wreckage
left in the wake of the
155mm Howitzer shells

the wreckage of
more than one hundred
but how many more than
one hundred?
no one will ever count

too few whole bodies left to tell
too many disparate bits of human beings
scattered around the ground
& who knows how many
eaten
eaten
by the dogs
in the night?

she told the French Foreign Minister
rocked him out of his
PR photo op

his face a ghastly white mask
his aides muttering in confusion
his translator droning on
in painful monotone
his delicate handkerchief
pressed to his delicate nostrils
his refined diplomatic eyes
wishing they'd never glimpsed
this old woman
telling her death-stories
while the cameras were rolling

her simple words etched an atrocity
scrawling it all over his forced geniality,
deepening the lines there in his face

& his unguarded undiplomatic horror -

worth a thousand bloodied snapshots
for all the world to see.

 
.................................
Breakfast Politics
.................................

afternoon breakfast
mixing the herbs
olive green & seedy
from sesame
in a painted Moroccan bowl
replete with arabesques

& olive oil

zahtar, this combination
based in thyme
older than
the Lebanese cedars
maybe

sometimes
sentimental
I spread
the oily herbs on a doughy surface
tracing its roundness with my fingers
        think it's almost like pizza
        think college summers
        think western Massachusetts
enjoy the taste
of
fresh-baked nostalgia

sometimes
more restive
I roll them up
inside croissant pastry triangles
        think of the hollow insides
filling out
closing the gaps

rising up
in the heat

those are the times
I eat the mixed metaphor

& remember Beirut

.................................
Alex Uttermann
.................................

 
Copyright © Alex Uttermann
May 1997

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