Why Not?

  Well, why not?

Why Not?

I see hungry children crying beside warehouses of food

I see the elderly cold hungry alone in an ocean of plenty

I feel anger when caskets draped in that coloured rag

carried home with military pomp weeping families

another causality of greed privilege power

Day and daily I see greed praised as success

rich as celebrities poor as failures

I swim in a sea of fabricated illusions where privilege is progress

where truth dies a lonely death somewhere in a corner of our heart

Yet within my heart I have millions of seeds of love

I know I must plant and let grow

So why shouldn’t I be an anarchist?

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I Am.

 

FIRES OF THE FUTURE.

I am fire,
I surge, I hiss,
sometimes bursting forth in a flame
that lights up the world
illuminating unimagined dreams.
Then the black cloak
blankets out the glow.
Again all is dark,
but, still
beneath the surface
I surge, I hiss,
I endure, waiting, seeking,
building up pressure.
One day I will explode
destroying forever
the Tartarean crust of oppression.
I am fire,
I am the people.

        The people of Colombia have been on the streets for 67 consecutive days, facing savage brutality in the form of torture, beatings, disappearances, live ammunition  and rape at the hands of the state's minders, the police. This shows to what lengths the state will go to subdue the people, and it also shows what the people are facing in their struggle for justice, equality and freedom. The new world of justice for all will not be created on social media, it will not be legislated into being within the corridors of power. That world that belongs to the people and functions for all the people, will only be won on the streets, in the workplaces and in the local communities. A major weapon in that struggle will be the solidarity between communities, but that solidarity must cross those imaginary lines drawn by the power mongers, borders must fall, national flags used as firelighters. There can be no divisions between the ordinary people. It is one world, we are one people, this world is ours by right of the sweat, toil and blood of our previous generations.

I AM THE CROWD.

I am the crowd
I swim in the quagmire of poverty
its hooks, its barbs, tear my flesh
rupture my dreams,
I hold my breath for centuries
hoping to break through, gasp pure air.
Through the murky mire
I see bright things, shiny things, sparkle
I see women in fine dresses, men in silk shirts.
I ask myself,
why do I swim in this cesspool?
I want the light and warmth of rectitude
to caress my labouring body,
seeds of my dreams to bloom
like wild flowers in a meadow.
One day, I will use my boundless strength
to haul this torn, battered being
out of the morass
onto the warm grassy bank,
when I do;
woe betide you, women in fine dresses
woe betide you mister in your fine silk shirt
should you ever try to get in my way,
for I am the strength of the world,
I am the crowd.

Medellín. Colombia. 

          A few days ago, during the anti-government protests in Medellin, Colombia a 15 year old girl was raped by the police. On July 2, groups of feminists set fire to the police station with Molotov cocktails.

Originally published by Abolition Media Worldwide.

        This is not an isolated case, since the protests started, more than 2 months ago, 28 women have been raped.
         The uprising in Colombia has hit its 67th consecutive day. Despite hundreds of people being killed and disappeared, and police shooting out the eyes of demonstrators, people have been returning to the streets, fighting back valiently, burning police stations and attacking police.

Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info  

Cities Stained With Blood.

        Every house, every road, every building, each ship ever launched, the trucks the trains and all the goods they carry, all stained with the sweat and blood of the ordinary people. Industrial disease, injury and death are the units of exchange to furnish our cities and towns. The shiny new car, the mobile phone, the shopping mall, all sanitized to hide their origin, trace them back to the earth they came from, and you'll find them nourished with blood.

 

The Road Builders

(“Who built the beautiful roads?” queried a friend of the present order, as we walked one day along the macadamized driveway of Fairmount Park.)

I saw them toiling in the blistering sun,
Their dull, dark faces leaning toward the stone, Their knotted fingers grasping the rude tools,
Their rounded shoulders narrowing in their chest,
The sweat dro’s dripping in great painful beads.
I saw one fall, his forehead on the rock,
The helpless hand still clutching at the spade,
The slack mouth full of earth.

And he was dead.
His comrades gently turned his face, until
The fierce sun glittered hard upon his eyes,
Wide open, staring at the cruel sky.
The blood yet ran upon the jagged stone;
But it was ended. He was quite, quite dead:
Driven to death beneath the burning sun,
Driven to death upon the road he built.

He was no “hero”, he; a poor, black man,
Taking “the will of God” and asking naught;
Think of him thus, when next your horse’s feet
Strike out the flint spark from the gleaming road;
Think that for this, this common thing, The Road,
A human creature died; ‘tis a blood gift,
To an o’er reaching world that does not thank.
Ignorant, mean and soulless was he? Well —
Still human; and you drive upon his corpse.

Philadelphia, 24 July 1900

Voltairine de Cleyre

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At Strife,---Still!

    David Edelstadt, 1866 - 1892, Russian born anarchist, immigrated to America aged 15, he was deeply involved in developing the anarchist movement in New York. An activist and excellent poet, he died at the age of 26 from tuberculosis. The sentiments in his poetry still apply today, the same struggle that he immersed himself in, is still exploiting, killing and repressing people today. When will we ever learn.

      These are the last three verses from his poem

 AT STRIFE.

To liberate the poor and the enslaved
Who suffer now from cold and hunger's blight,
And to create for all humanity
A world that shall be free, that shall be bright;

A world where tears no longer shall be shed,
A world where guiltless blood no more shall flow,
And men and women, like clear-shining stars,
With courage and with love shall be aglow.

You may destroy us, tyrants! 'Twill be vain.
Time will bring on new fighters strong as we;
For we shall battle ever, on and on,
Nor cease to strive till all the world is free!
David Edelstadt

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WHAT'S IN A WORD?

ANARCHY

Ever reviled, accursed, ne'er understood,
Thou art the grisly terror of our age.
"Wreck of all order," cry the multitude,
"Art thou, & war & murder's endless rage."
0, let them cry. To them that ne'er have striven
The 'truth that lies behind a word to find,
To them the word's right meaning was not given.
They shall continue blind among the blind.
But thou, O word, so clear, so strong, so true,
Thou sayest all which I for goal have taken.
I give thee to the future! Thine secure
When each at least unto himself shall waken.
Comes it in sunshine? In the tempest's thrill?
I cannot tell - but it the earth shall see!
I am an Anarchist! Wherefore I will
Not rule, & also ruled I will not be!

— John Henry Mackay 

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