Ferlinghetti Florilegium
endless the ever-unwinding watchspring heart of the world shimmering in time shining through space as if they were watching some odorless TV ad in which everything is always possible Where are Whitman’s wild children, where…
Category: Dissidents
Wartime during Life/3
We Expect the Germans To know their own historyTo tell the truth about their warTo refuse rationalizations and excusesTo act responsibly here and nowHowever many decadesAgo that was The world expects the AmericansTo know their…
Wartime during Life/1
What Catches Our Attention (And What Doesn’t) Reshma observed About a group of doctors she works with “They talk all about Lady Gaga But nothing about the wars we’re in” For Robert To Whom It…
Share the Wealth –The War on Journalism: The Case of Julian Assange, A Film by Juan Passarelli
Journalists are under attack globally for doing their jobs. Julian Assange is facing a 175 year sentence for publishing if extradited to the United States. The Trump administration has gone from denigrating journalists as ‘enemies…
Political Holiness
Pedro Casaldáliga & José-Maria Vigil, Political Holiness: A Spirituality of Liberation Those who struggle for utopia, for radical change, saints marked by the liberating spirit, are all of a piece; they carry faithfulness from the…
Solidaridad/1
In the mid-1980s while working at St. William Church in Louisville, I was involved with the Sanctuary Movement. The church offered hospitality to a couple from El Salvador, Manuel and Maria Elena. They were the…
The Way It Looked in 1969
Now the age of 101, Lawrence Ferlinghetti has composed poetical works about most U.S. presidents since the administrations of Eisenhower in the 1950s. I recall with appreciation his poem “Tale Tale of the Tall Cowboy”…
A Hierarchy of Human Life?
Nawal El Saadawi, The Essential Reader In his poem “Cosmopolitan Greetings,” Allen Ginsberg urged: Stand up against governments, against God. This expresses the life and work of Nawal El-Saadawi. I am African from Egypt, not…
After Sanders Makes His Endorsement, I Turn to Some Great Reminderers
Those who live by compassion are often canonized. Those who live by justice are often crucified. –John Dominic Crossan, Scripture Scholar, USA Don’t mourn. Organize. –Mother Jones, labor activist, USA The madness of violence must…
Hope’s Beautiful Daughters: A Spring & Summer Class
Hope has two beautiful daughters. Their names are anger and courage: anger at the way things are, and courage to see that they do not remain the way they are. — Saint Augustine Why…