A Chorus of Mourning Echoing Out Toward Mecca | Ted Vaca

A Chorus of Mourning Echoing Out Toward Mecca

BY TED VACA

the chosen people
god’s blessed
people

brutalized attacked and slandered
beaten throughout centuries
wandering through
a mist of sorrow
through world wars
through a cemetery
the size of the Sea of Reeds

then blessed by God
and nations and given
back their homeland
holy land
returned to Zion
oh Israel oh holy land
oh El Elohe Yisrael
oh The Mighty One
God of Israel

how terrifying you’ve become
how brutal your power how punishing
your vengeance how bloody your hands

you’ve let loose
the leash of the angels
of the apocalypse
upon your neighbors
and upon their land
God’s hell has risen

now the broken people
now the occupied
the scattered descendants
of the conquered bombed
to dust their hospitals
their places of worship
their schools their people
their children their lineage
their line of hope obliterated
in the constant barrage
of revenge

only the law of God
matters El Elohe Yisrael
only the law of Israel
above the laws of men
of war of nations
above the internationals
from above comes the law
from above the blessing
of violations of wanton cruelty
from above the blessings
of starvation the blessings
of suffering the blessings
of obliteration of the grave
of the dark

terror begets terror begets terror
begets the horror show begets
infinite suffering a sea of tears
a grand canyon of corpses

for your neighbors
not mercy but broken bones
not compassion but severed bodies
for your neighbors there is no salt
no bread no wine but disease
starvation and poisoned water

oh Palestine the world watches
and not much is done and what is
done seems as spit into the wind
as spit on to the face of Palestine

Palestine no mother’s day
Palestine no fourth of July
Palestine no apple pie
no answers from Salat no call from God
no response from the deepening chorus
of mourning echoing out toward Mecca
and bouncing off the Kaaba

Ted Vaca is a Denver area based poet and performer.  He began writing steadily in the late 1980’s in his home state of California.  He has been published in numerous publications and has self-published two chapbooks.  He is a member of the 1995 Asheville National Slam Poetry Championship team.  He is a founding member of The Mercury Cafe Poetry Slam, (Denver, CO.) established in 2000, and ongoing since then.  He is the coach of the 2006 Mercury Cafe Slam Championship team.  He has hosted countless poetry readings and slams and special events throughout his 35-plus years in catering toward poetic pursuits.

Ted is an award winner of Colorado’s Lulu award for accomplishments in poetry and The James Ryan Morris Tombstone award.

Ted has worked for Art from Ashes, a Colorado based not for profit that encourages and teaches healing through art therapy, catering to youth in illness and at risk.