Call and Answer

Call and Answer


Tell me why it is we don't lift
our voices these days
And cry over what is happening.
Have you noticed the plans
are made for Iraq
and the ice cap is melting?

I say to myself: "Go on, cry.
What's the sense
Of being an adult and having no voice?
Cry out!
See who will answer!
This is Call and Answer!"

We will have to call especially loud
to reach our angels,
who are hard of hearing;
they are hiding
In the jugs of silence
filled during our wars.

Have we agreed to so many wars
that we can¹t escape from silence?
If we don¹t lift our voices,
we allow others (who are ourselves)
to rob the house.

How come we¹ve listened
to the great criers -- Neruda,
Akhmatova, Thoreau, Frederick Douglass--
and now we're silent as sparrows
in the little bushes?

Some masters say our life
lasts only seven days.
Where are we in the week?
Is it Thursday yet?
Hurry, cry now!
Soon Sunday night will come.


-- Robert Bly

Posted over on Poets Against the War