Francisco de Goya, Saturno devorando a su hijo 1819-1823 (public domain)
War is anthropophagy,
Leningrad gangs roaming
streets lined with
bread made of sawdust
picking dog-meat from
between their teeth
with rat-bone toothpicks
the Butcher salivates
examining the thigh –
castrates his male victim
Wendigo psychosis of leadership
warmongering cowards consume
the poor, these huddled masses
blood lust dilated pupils
loll in sockets reddened
by thoughts of feasting
ideological sacrifices for
120 seconds of silence
organ donors to greed
black acrimonious humor
gives the Butcher a voracious
appetite for human flesh
war profiteers gather and gain
vorarephilia inspired erections
rubbing together in orgiastic frenzy
crunch, squelch, he wipes
grease from his cheek, excretes
gluttonous cries of pleasure
millions are slaughtered
in a ritualistic, magical
cannibalism mimicking
Lord’s Resistance Army
training, in a flurry of
deadliest conflict
one-upmanship
Saturn devours
his children
one by one
Map of Cannibalism (public domain)
Written for Poetics prompt at dVerse Poets Pub where I tried to follow Karin’s advice to take no prisoners: http://dversepoets.com/2012/11/10/armisticetruce-making-peace-with-poetics/
Chromapoetica 
Well, I’m not sure that you didn’t take any prisoners here, but I can attest that they will not have a long shelf-life!
Very striking poem – I love the Goya and you’ve put the image in writing. Personally, I think the shorter lines work incredibly well for you, I think, as they make the concepts and your precise but layered lines much more approachable.
It’s pretty terrific the way this poem moves from the siege of Leningrad to Joseph Kony. And the butcher… is chilling – especially I thought in his introductory stanza where he seems to examine the leg and then…swipe. Well done, Anna! (Though yikes!) k.
Good one! It’s funny as the poem came first and then Goya provided the terror to set the mood. I’m so happy to hear this worked for you, thank you!
Wendigo psychosis of leadership…nice…geez anna….so many great lines i coul dprobably quote most of it back to you and tell you how good or witty it is…really nicely done…love the kinda break outs as well within it…(italics)…ideological sacrifices for
120 seconds of silence
organ donors to greed…nice stanza that…really well played anna…
some vicious imagery as well…in your face in a good way….smiles…
ok i will stop now…smiles.
I really appreciate your feedback Brian. I’ve needed to get this poem out of my system for a while so I think that’s why it’s so intensely dark. As a pacificist I wonder what it will take for us to give up this filthy habit of war.
Chilling…..to the bone! Very visceral.
The horrors of war always tear at my heart.
The weaving of the narrative, specially the butcher and Saturn, is well done ~ The last stanza though is dark and chilling for me ~
Thanks Grace, I thought it might work better if there was a direct actor within the poem.
I agree on the shorter lines–this is instantly absorbed into the bloodstream, like straight sugar, or perhaps straight grain alcohol. The tie-in of sexuality and gluttony to the cannibalism of war is inspired and only enforces its perversion. There is absolutely no excuse for what we have done, continue to do and in some black minds, live on doing.
I hadn’t heard of vorarephilia until today, one of those images I’d like to delete from my memory banks. I agree with you wholeheartedly.
Yikes! If I have nightmares tonight, I will know who to blame! Edgy stuff!
The warmongerers :)?
oh my anna…this is awesome…each kind of war is a sort of canibalism…a frickin awesome write
Oh Claudia, thank you for your kind words!
“Leningrad gangs roaming
streets lined with
bread made of sawdust
picking dog-meat from
between their teeth
with rat-bone toothpicks”
So visual.
Yes, it was my hook :).
The truth that underlies this is, at the very least, chilling. Incredible graphic, too.
Yes, the darkest parts of our humanity.
Your poem expresses your feelings about war, for sure the horrors of war tear at our hearts. Shorter lines than usual for you, Anna, working well in this poem ~ love the two voices ~ most effective
Thanks Polly, I tried to find the right fit for the subject. I look forward to reading yours.
Very dark and explorative Anna, and filled with wonderful and wicked words that only you could find and combine!
Great alliteration! Thank you, I wanted to explore something I would generally avoid, to stretch a bit.
You KNOW I’m loving this!….fantastically explored piece that almost embodies the planet as a cannibal, feasting on its own- very much like the figure in De Goya’s painting….it seems that as humans we have this inherent ‘cannabilistic’ quality that we seem unable to escape from…we want to destroy, shoot, bomb, kill, eat each other….throws. Up an interesting question….if it IS inherent…can we, as ‘intelligent’ humans, ever escape from it?…can we ever have peace…history would say no…my head says no….but maybe my heart still holds some hope…great poem Anna
Stu, marvelous to see you again! I hear you loud and clear on your concerns about humanity (love your throw(s) up word play). I too war internally over whether humans will be capable of lasting peace. Looking at our historical record I see reason for extreme pessimism but as an optimist there that inner resistance, positing that it must be possible.
War is the mother and death the son, timely reminder that reconciliation is real victory
Yes and real victory is the goal.
wow, anna… disturbing and brilliant.
yes, you did warn me – i am glad i did not listen. 😉 great work.
Thanks Miriam, I’m glad you didn’t listen either :).
Well, you sure succeeded in taking no prisoners – and just as well, too, in the circumstances! This read like a nightmare scenario of the end. Disturbing in the extreme – but for its purpose not too extreme.
Yes, I had dreams about it (though those being consumed were baby mice) but I honestly couldn’t see another way of expressing this horror. I always value your feedback, thank you.
In the end, we are all pieces of meat and if someone is hungry enough, they’ll eat. Nothing in war is glorious at all. The only winner are the arms dealers who get richer with every bullet they sell. War is butchery and you have showed it all here at its most savage. We need armed forces to protect our countries from being invaded but, as a so called civillised species now, wars should be a thing of the past.
Anna, how many times can people tell you, you are a genius with your poetry. Yuck on the content but, what a brilliant read.
Thank you for your well considered comment and again for your service in the UK. It was particularly frightening to go through an election cycle with another cowboy candidate that made endless war seem like a positive reflection of American values.
A little graphic for my delicate nature:) Powerfully horrific.I don’t know what vorarephilia erections are and I have decided I best not know. Suspect it’s something horrendous.Please do not tell me:)
Trust me, the poem offended my sensibilities greatly. I will happily keep you in the dark as to the meaning of vorarephilia. That you found it powerfully horrific tells me that my job as poet was done effectively and I greatly appreciate your feedback.
I agree – the metaphor of a cannibalistic planet is not overstated – whatever you have graphically painted here pales to the actual pain, brutality, viciousness of war. A full out protest piece that shocks the reader to thought!
Yes, as these are merely words upon a computer screen and the legacy of war is a permanent scar (psychological, physical, spiritual) or tombstone. I attempted a shock and awe campaign where complicity or apathy isn’t a possible response. Thank you Gay for your thoughtful response.
I think she meant “take no prisoners” in terms of doing good job at making peace. But there ain’t no peace, no armistice here!
Gruesome. Fantastic horror.
Your literary and historical knowledge is huge!
On my other site I used this image to talk about atrophying myths and how allusions loose their power and show how new fiction images (Sci Fi etc) are taking their place.
I had to look up:
(1) Wendigo psychosis
(2) vorarephilia
Poems like this need links! I wonder how many just skip over these words — I’d guess 95% of your readers here. What do you think?
I am aware of what she meant. My intent was to do a good job at making readers think about the necessity of peace by making war seem as unappealing and reprehensible as I could given the time constraints. You found definitions without difficulty as others could have or did. If you use Chrome as a browser you can right click on any word and search Google for it, it’s like having the entire internet annotated. Thank you for your suggestions and including links for future readers, that was considerate.
Ahhh, well you certainly did do that, and very well.
And thanks much for the Google hint — I do use Chrome. That is fantastic! I will be using it a lot — it will save me many keystrokes!
I forgot to add you have to highlight the word first, then right click. You’re quite welcome. I find it comes in handy :).
I am fairly tech savvy, but last night when I excitedly told my 12 year-old about this trick he informed he that he already knew this “of course” and that I was tech ignorant. Oh well, we all live with our illusions — but maybe it is time for me to admit that my savvy is only relative to folks over 40! ;-(
BTW, I just watched “The Wrath of the Titans” with my son. I am surprised to say, this made Greek mythology more real to me.
First, being raised Christian (and fanatic about it at one stage), I always felt that thinking of the gods as being so petty, jealous and sexual was infantile. So stories of Greek gods just seemed silly. The movie showed me a gods-mixing-with-humans model that seemed less silly — albeit fantastic.
I was surprised at how the movie did that — and not a movie I would recommend to others.
The main plot of that movie was that Cronus (Saturn) would be released from his captivity in Tartarus and then destroy humanity. Knowing Cronus had devoured his own children, made it clear he was evil.
Anyway, wanted to tell how a present day B movie could make old Greek stuff alive again. I wonder how long Greek myths will live. Because they snuck into our language, I imagine they will be around a while.
I have always wished that the Mahabharata myths would have been ours instead — they seem very rich too.
PS – I use to work in a high-security prison where I cared for two guys that would eat themselves. Over the years, I have become very bigotted about men — the vast majority of the violence and horror I have seen has been in men (and I see it in myself). I read an interesting theory once that this is because of male-bonding. Apparently male Bonomos (peaceful ape – relatively) don’t bond like their far more violent cousins, Chimpanzees. So if genetic engineers should do anything, it is figure out how turn of the male bonding gene. How would the world look then?
PSS — the checkbox below this comment box says “Notify me of new posts via email” — WordPress allows you to turn that off and turn on the “Notify if new comments” function. I just want to follow comments here, not each post. [I follow posts by RSS]. Thought you might not realize that you had this turned on and not the other.
I haven’t seen The Wrath of the Titans, I tend to watch art house, foreign, and independent films though sometimes catch Hollywood blockbusters. I enjoy Mahabharata and Ramayana, very rich indeed. I’ve read about the Bonobo chimps and the matriarchial structure of their society. It is fascinating how they differ from the cousins across the river. I changed the selection on comments now that WordPress has disengaged the auto-follow option.
I am a huge consumer of Foreign films – huge. But with children (not sure if you have any), I have begun to watch more Hollywood stuff — one way to get kids to hate something is to try to force them to like it, eh? I had to look up “Art House” and see that it is also a category I watch that none of my friends watch — fortunately my wife likes “Art House” also — though she is not a huge foreign film fan.
The reason I like these is the same reason I often drive different, longer paths on journeys that I repeat: breaking patterns helps open my eyes. Yet it is just a trick. For we accommodate easily to even that which breaks patterns — ah, the human mind.
Glad you fixed the button — now I can follow. Commenting on old posts is good because my mailbox won’t get flooded by “Mr.-Linky-visit-and-compliment-me-too” comments. 🙂
No, no children, but have seen lots of odd things with my three goddaughters :).
Anna this is an amazing piece. You are an exceptional writer. Glad I found this piece. I look forward to reading more of your wonderful art.
Thank you David, it’s very nice to meet you. I enjoyed your poem and look forward to reading more of your work at dVerse.
You have poured yourself into this one, drawing us in to see war as you see it–expertly written, but not a pretty poem, which is just as it should be.
Nico, you leave awesome comments.