Welcome to "In Our Own Words," the Ezine from BBBooks. We publish and distribute books, list "Calls for Submissions," Contests, and Writing Classes here on our web site.

We are a grass roots organization, not a corporate entity, so we don't dance to the dollar sign. You can expect to find thought- provoking, creative, alternative writing, information and politics right here. We offer the "People Before Profits Poetry Prize" each year and offer all kinds of other stuff for writers, poets, students, educators, spiritual types, feminists, humanists, and activists. We're people who follow their conscience, but like to have fun too!

The writers in this edition of "In Our Own Words" range in age from their teens to their 80s.

Our editorial philosophy is simple: Writers respond to life; they chronicle our times and remind us what it is like to be human.
Extraordinary writing strikes a truth and reflects how events in our nutty world affect us. While vulgarity is often a part of our daily lives, vulgarity for the sake of shock value doesn't benefit anyone. We accept all styles and forms of poetry and prose. While the writing we've chosen reminds us that life isn't always pretty, we will always dream of it being extraordinary!

Refuge
(For Afshin)
©2002 Ekere Tallie

The only peaceful
place I know
is you

your hands remind me
there are still sunflowers
rivers embroidered
with deep, orange moons

sometimes I dream
of missiles and dust
of climbing spiral staircases
until Iím out of breath
and when I awaken
I am tired
no rest in my sleep
and still no change

but when you sing
I think, ìmaybeî
and my smile shakes the soot
from its shoulders

and I canít give you anything,
yet we hold each other
and rustle the dark
my only peace
is the glimmer
in your kiss,
but in the morning
you will take that away
because you must
because you are strong enough
to believe
what I donít--
that there will be
a tomorrow

you will fold your affection
until you meet the woman
who can wear it
and she will be dazzling
in your love, I know

and me?
I will stitch
your name to keep
nightmares at bay

I will quilt peace

How We Can Achieve World Peace
©2002 Ekere Tallie

You and I framed blue
on a sunny San Francisco day
my hair swept back
in the laugh of your arms
your eyes speak
a sweet, quiet mischief

and if the world could feel
this warm these tears would stop

you are farther than hope
in this country

I should tell you:
the whir of planes
leaves me grasping
for strands of prayer

we memorize touch now
leaning into each other
with hesitant good-byes
and there is no gift
like morning
pulling us stubbornly
to life

you and I framed blue
by love, enough love
to stop rumbling tanks
and bombs and triggers

The answer is simple.

Haiku
©2002 Ekere Tallie

Poetry is a
wind chime whisper. God's water
for dry, cracking souls.

This Desire
©2002 Padma Jared Thornlyre

Perhaps it's wishful thinking,
this desire to paint myself
an iconoclast or curmudgeon.

Perhaps it's simple honesty.
I'm not so happy as a better
Buddhist in my suffering,

nor can I wallow contentedly
in a post-modern affected angst
or a post-punk ennui. Raw

cynicism doesn't become me,
and Anger's the face of our
enemy: bin Laden, Sharon

and Falwell-that triple-
headed beast, that Cerberus
pacing the gates of Hell.

I've seen my share of butchers-
Nixon, Pol Pot, Chairman Mao,
Reagan and Milosovich-

and there is but one wide
blind eye on every pyramid
of skulls, guarding every mass

grave, crowning every tangle
of steel and limb, fuselage
and girder: the eye of God,

of passionate intensity. I'd
be among the best, if you'll
forgive the hard-on: in crisis

I want to fuck myself silly,
toss down a shot or two
of Maker's Mark, and find

the glass bong I haven't seen
since Iowa. Yeah, I'm human,
and damn, but it fuckin' hurts.

There's a rockslide on the rez
where the Rosebud Lakota
are too hungry to give a shit

about al-Qaida. It's a white
man's war, a WWF match
featuring Mohammed, Jesus

and Moses-a sold-out clash
of steroid steel-all three in
the ring at the same bloody time!

Last one standing wins
a big gawdy belt, a Coors
with The Rock and a crack

at "The Cliff," Gautama, who
just sits there, exhales, and
takes another deep breath.

Christ In Me
©2002 Bonnie J. Manion

Awake in bed,
I cannot move.
I've not the strength
for what I would.
I'm old and weak,
cold in my bones.
I cannot turn
or hold the phone.
If I cry out
someone may come
and turn my form,
drape off the sun.
I wait for spoon,
I wait for the cup,
for by myself
I cannot sup.
Someone must push
my arm through sleeve
or that dropped sock,
kind one retrieve.
I cannot choose
what I will wear.
I cannot brush
my teeth or hair.
Old friends long gone,
kin not inclined
to sit and talk,
to spend some time.
My mind plays tricks
with sanity:
it shows me things
my eyes don't see
Iwait for drink
or other need,
give no advice
for no one heeds.
As here I lie
in bed of pain,
it's Christ in me
stretched out again.

The Raft
(For Elian Gonzalez)
Fiona Parrott

They now auction
the raft
that carried a boy's life.
Thirty thousand
dollars.

Internet connections flicker,
neon vacant eyes,
signs
and the marching continues.
The raft is rubber.
Freedom of Speech.
He's six years old.

Forget the pens
no need for swords,
they've got a life
to joust with.
Watch for the blood
stains,
ladies and gentlemen.

The raft is yellow.
His skin is stained
by sea and sweat,
blisters and scars,
shaky hands.
'Mamá?' he asks
again.

Thirty-five thousand.
Keep on bidding.
Bet on Cuba
Castro
Clinton
Miami and its mayor.
Freedom of Speech.
The raft is taut.
We want, we want
we will protest.

Forty thousand.
And the throngs of bodies
say,
this is all about
justice.
Internet connections flicker.
Selling the soil
he first set barefoot on.
Freedom.
He's six years old.
Speak!
The raft floats.
The raft holds five,
comfortably.

Forty-five.
And they use him
as their flag
against a cause
we don't understand.
A cause that breaks
sympathy down
into smeared letters
covering
a newspaper's front page.

Internet connections flicker.
The raft is shiny.
The raft is smooth.

Justice.
Speak about freedom.
Gotta fight, fight, fight
for justice.

Read all about it.
The soldier with the gun.
Front page news
to the end
of this beginning
that will never have
six years of life.
The raft tastes salty.
Internet connections flicker.

The raft is round
as a wheel.
There is a rope
around justice.
BANG!
Internet connections flicker
then fade.

Fifty thousand
Dollars.
SOLD.
SOLD.
SOLD.

To today's highest bidder.

Those Who Speak of the Enemy
Are the Enemy Themselves.
Abby Lynn Bogomolny
Dedicated to brilliance of Bertolt Brecht; I am indebted to him for obvious reasons.

Welcome to the new Germany, but our führer is not a house painter;
he is a windshield cowboy
and he loves to talk on the telephone.

Inside his wealthy family, it is considered crass
to talk about food or home prices:
since they own all they will ever need.

The homeless sleep in the doorways of San Francisco, the beaches of Florida and the subways of New York. They harass workers on their way to the bus as housing prices rise.

The windshield cowboy has a briefcase filled with national security speeches he must memorize. He prefers to hear them on headphones, instead of read them on paper.

Many in the nation would like security: Temporary, part time workers;
workfare single mothers need security. Black and Brown men need security away from police profiles. Doctors need security when HMOs deny them payment. Neighborhoods near military bases need security from exposure to toxics.. People with permanent jobs want the security of knowing they will be able to retire.

General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman all have new contracts. Their stock prices have soared since the September 11th.
Hands that were idle are designing new weapons.

New uniforms for Americorps and the armed services have been ordered.
The Department of Homeland Security will monitor all of us as the BIA continues to steal the homes and land of the native people of this continent.

The people are afraid because 3000 died in New York.
Emotions cloud reason like soot hides the skyline, dirty business at the top, say dirty bomb and the country will spread its legs for illegal search and seizure; people are more likely to accept anything if denied the truth.

The windshield cowboy compromises civil liberties in the name of protecting us. He overrides the fourth amendment. He disappears immigrants and does not release their names. He holds American citizens in military detention based on secret evidence, without charges. He has studied Germany through watching videos.

He raids social security but demands sacrifice of those who have spent down their bank accounts.
He hides his family's ties to the Carlyle Group's investments with the bin Laden family, but freezes the assets of charities sending money to relatives in Africa, the Middle East and South Asia.
His associates pad their portfolios and preach to the victims of Global Crossing, Enron and MCI Worldcom of promising new markets.
He leads the country into judicial seizures, but calls international treaties too binding to fight his war.
The windshield cowboy empties warehouses as he talks of filling them.
The only storerooms to be filled are those owned by his family’s oil and weapons businesses. When he talks on the telephone, he promises his elite third world clients countries a percentage of the booty. If they remain independent, sabotaging them will also help the family business.

He knows that young men and women in uniforms are sexy. He looks at color photographs in catalogues.

Those in charge say: this way to adulthood and a paycheck.
Those at the bottom say: this way to the grave.

When it comes to flying fighter jets, pilots do not know that their enemy is he who has decided they must fly. Their enemy is the voice that has given them their orders.

The windshield cowboy says the country will use unilateral military force when and where it chooses and will punish those who engage in terrorism.
His definition of terrorism is what he says it is.

Unlike the windshield cowboy, the führer of Germany was democratically elected.

"If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation wants crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters... Power concedes nothing without demand. It never did and it never will..."
Frederick Douglass 1857

full quotation in context: http://www.publiceye.org/buildingequality/quotes/frederickdouglass.htm

 How You Can Be Published:

There are several ways. You can also send in poetry or short prose of your own to be considered for IN OUR OWN WORDS, THE EZINE FROM BBBOOKS. We also recommend looking at the Classifieds in Poets and Writers Magazine, visiting our Calls for Submission Page, or entering one of the contests like our "People Before Profits Poetry Prize". Only entires that include a SASE (self addressed stamped envelope) will be returned, so be sure to include this with your work. See our editorial philosphy above.