War
News

1.
I use my cane to keep
the turning earth in place
below me

I listen for the words
of chaos music spoken
by those who
handle snakes and
killing
as acts of faith

2.
There was a secret
that I wanted
to tell you
about how the war
would end after we
awoke in each other’s
dreams

3.
i brought my lips to
the ashen shadow of your
body

you tasted of the
displaced sea
and the restless
mountains

4.
We have reached the days
when saying goodnight
is not enough anymore

I took the marking pen
and wrote your name
on your arm

and you did the same
for me

.

War
News

I’ve seen countless photographs
of wounded children in Gaza
whose faces and clothes
were covered in the ashen
concrete dust of the bombings
that they have barely survived

Their expressions range from a
lasting terror
to a stunned bewilderment
buried in a blank stare

But if there are two or more children
sitting on a gurney or on the
floor of an aid station or standing together
their absent lives tied to them
like a bloody bandage

They hold onto the small sibling or stranger
next to them
they sit or stand as close as possible
so they will not sink out of sight
and be pulled alone into another oblivion

.

Beau Beausoleil is a poet and activist based in San Francisco, California. His two most recent chapbooks are, The Killing of George Floyd (Intermittent Press 2023 and Poems for Ukraine (BarleyBooks (UK) 2023.