Speak Out

Speak Out

And a vast paranoia sweeps
across the land
And America turns the attack
on its Twin Towers
Into the beginning
of the Third World War
The war with the Third World

And the terrorists in Washington
Are drafting all the young men

And no one speaks

And they are rousting out
All the ones with turbans
And they are flushing out
All the strange immigrants

And they are shipping
all the young men
To the killing fields again

And no one speaks

And when they come to round up
All the great writers
and poets and painters
The National Endowment of the Arts
of Complacency
Will not speak

While all the young men
Will be killing all the young men
In the killing fields again

So now is the time for you to speak
All you lovers of liberty
All you lovers of
the pursuit of happiness
All you lovers and sleepers
Deep in your private dreams

Now is the time for you to speak
O silent majority
Before they come for you


-- Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Posted over on Poets Against the War