Turn to the Artists

This morning I woke to new layers of snow and Adrienne Rich's voice in my head.  The line that was running through my head was "a patriot is not a weapon", and when I got up I went to the bookshelf and pulled out An Altas of the Difficlut World Poems 1988-1991.  There are many poems that I appreciated and loved and the touched me when I first read this book,  then I heard her read some of the poems and I was touched even more deeply.  I am pained by the state of the world, by my own distrust and fear of my own president, and by the way that so much communication is meant to keep us apart, separate and in conflict.  The reality is we have more in common, but that doesn't sell newspapers, or cable television or fake news - so here we are in the midst of actions that we know not the consequences.  We know that people who own OIL will make lots of money,  people who are a part of the military complex will become richer more emboldened.  And for me, this morning I find solace in reading poetry of this transformational lesbian, feminist poet.

When asked about poetry and it's impact on social change this is what she said in an interview:

 
Yes, where poetry is liberative language, connecting the fragments within us, connecting us to others like and unlike ourselves, replenishing our desire. . . . In poetry words can say more than they mean and mean more than they say. In a time of frontal assaults both on language and on human solidarity, poetry can remind us of all we are in danger of losing—disturb us, embolden us out of resignation.

This quote was the beginning of an article in the New Yorker written four years after her death in 2012.

 So here is the poem that the fragments were running through my head as I woke this morning:

 A patriot is not a weapon. A patriot is one who wrestles for the soul of her country
as she wrestles for her own being, for the soul of his country
(gazing through the great circle at Window Rock into the sheen of the Viet Nam Wall)
as he wrestles for his own being. A patriot is a citizen trying to wake
from the burnt-out dream of innocence, the nightmare
of the white general and the Black general posed in their camouflage,
to remember her true country, remember his suffering land: remember
that blessing and cursing are born as twins and separated at birth to meet again in mourning
that the internal emigrant is the most homesick of all women and of all men
that every flag that flies today is a cry of pain.

 Where are we moored?

 What are the bindings?

 What behooves us? 

Section XI, An Atlas of the Difficult World  

Poems 1988-1991  Adrienne Rich 

With the questions of the poem dancing around inside myself I got in the car and headed out to UU services in Houlton,  I have found some mooring there and this morning was no different.  I lit a candle of Joy and Concern for the Truth Tellers, the Peace Makers and the Resistors.  I felt in community at the bottom of the program is Rainbow Flag with the UU flame and LGBTQ Welcoming Congregation.  I have been welcomed, I do feel moored and I am wrestling for the soul of my country and my own being.