Imagine Again
Imagine a de-militarized Middle East and then imagine a completely de-militarized world. It’s not so easy these days, but please try. –Eliot Katz, October 2023
Poems
Poems
Let Go the Heavy Flags of Hatred
Hamas has taken Israel by surprise and undertaken immoral, large-scale terror attacks from Gaza, breaking national gates, sending hundreds of deadly missiles into populated towns, riding rifled motorcycles and flying machete gliders, brutally murdering more than 900 innocents, including at …
Dear Kamala Harris
Dear Kamala Harris, congrats on being chosen to be the VP on the 2020 Democratic Party ticket. I made my first small donation to the Biden-Harris campaign this evening, partly because your initial email announcement highlighted Donald Trump as a …
Will Trump’s Wall Perform Magic Tricks?
Trump says a wall of concrete or steel slats has to be builtalong the U.S.-Mexico border for national security,so I am wondering what magic tricks it would perform:Could the wall tell that I have picked a jack of clubs …
Cable TV’s Ukraine War Analysts
I wonder if it would be possible for CNN and MSNBC to find more U.S. anti-war analysts opposed to Russia’s illegal and immoral invasion of the sovereign country of Ukraine who were not also generals, intelligence agents, or congress-persons that …
One Small Reason the President’s Border Wall and Muslim Ban Are Wrong
With crazy policies on weaponization and environmental regulation, Trump is clearly a greater threat to the planet than the people he is trying to keep out. Eliot Katz 2/17
The Donald Has Never Learned How to Deal with No
As a longtime CEO and TV reality star boss with the infamous tagline “you’re fired,” the Donald has not had much experience being told no. Trump hates losing in court and is already determined to flip the …
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Dinosaur Love
On the Museum of Natural History’s 4th floor I greeted my old friend: “Hey, T. Rex! Long time, no see!” My buddy flashed his killer teeth: “Over two years, E. Katz, I missed you.” Surprised, I asked, “You missed me? …
To The Vegetable Aisle
Under refrigerated water spray all looks healthy, romaine, red & green, boston bib, watercress— how choose a lettuce? How to know which of you has natural soil’s nutrients intact? Hey arrugula! Why haven’t I seen you …
When The Skyline Crumbles
Was sitting Astoria kitchen chair about to vote mayoral primary, then would’ve hopped subway to work Soho’s Spring Street — turned TV on for quick election check when CNN switched to picture of World Trade Center …
Elegy for Allen
Ah, Allen, you gave America a new shape & now you’ve lost yours what a long accomplished road it was from the bridge o’er Paterson Falls through San Francisco’s Six Gallery, Prague’s May King, Pentagon exorcisms, mid-America’s Iron …
What We Don’t See
Look at those trees! There are millions of ’em Where the cat treads lightly Whatever we don’t see is there A helicopter whirls overhead; we are not alone Strong winds coerce the leaves into speaking politely In forests like these, …
To The Northern Winds
Sitting in cabin kitchen with Vivian meditating with eyes open following breath out nostrils the day clear and beautiful but cold, and windy as hell it’s heaven up here in Canada’s north country no inkling of industrial air pollution not …
The Weather Seems Different
It is snowing in Athens tonight & Apollo with ice in his beard is having a difficult time singing About six twin engine miniplanes have crashed coast to coast in empty fields …
The Logic of War
1 A group of Bush Sr’s US-armed fundamentalist freedom fighters compared to our own founding fathers have become Bush Jr’s evildoers who need to be smoked from their caves– and the National Review philosophers say postmodern theory has wrecked …
Portraits / M.
He was wired, on crack or might as well– his 3-month welfare motel stay up next week and he was coming to our office for options. He settled on one after 10 minutes: was going to get his gun, blow …
These Beautiful Territories
The cloud outside the window is shaped like an angel The gods have forgotten to say goodbye to these beautiful territories It’s impossible to keep shoes unmuddy along these trails Danny was right, I should have brought a pair of …
In Praise of the Seattle Coalition
They came from around the globe to change the shape of the globe They formed a human chain and sidewalks declared their support They led labor down unpaved roads and mountain ranges from all sides tipped their peaks …
At the End of the Century
—written for Allen Ginsberg at his 70th birthday Ah century that has embraced me these past 39 years, that has set before my eyes so much tumult and catastrophe, that has taken too many of my friends and ravaged the …
What No God Knows
Even as I declare there is no god a subconscious one-eyed monster digs its bloody teeth into my lower back to protest. Most times I know that notions of who knows god best have …
Even a Poet Laureate Doesn’t Deserve to Get Beaten by the Police
As someone who doesn’t care much about government awards or titles given to artists, I still say a 70-year-old former Poet Laureate of the United States should have some extra layer of protection from getting beaten with billy clubs by …
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Gregory’s Last Lines
He was a poet of silk and the shredding of silk. No earthling nor deity remained immune from his probing questions. When the academy turned its head for a pulitzer second he slipped an enlightened humor worm into the gut …
Can We Have Some Peace and Quiet Please?
The belligerent voices are yelling in the streets & on the radios calling for the big bombs of peace to fall, the smart bombs, the bombs that have passed their college entrance exams. It’s Orwellian the way everyone claims Orwell …
For Mark Bradley, Songwriter & Chef
Walt Whitman is crying. One of his greatest and most grateful children has been taken far too early. Beyond nihilistic smokescreens and MTV’s glare of celebrated self-destructiveness, a few visionary potentials …
Ode to the Car Keys
In the late sixties we were so fed up we wanted to destroy it all. That’s when we changed the name of America and stuck in the “k”. The mood today is different, and the language that will respond to …
One Year Later
A year after 9/11, we still inhale the dust of our dead– still read NY Times portraits of a Springsteen fan, a lasagna home cooking specialist, a woman who would do anything for family …
Oklahoma City
I wonder where a Gulf War vet might get the ridiculous idea that you can solve all yr problems w/ bombs
7 Types of Bliss
–for Vivian No fires on the forest horizon but beautiful blue smoke emanating from inside. Vibrations at perfect complementary pitch from subatomic strings behind eyelids to moans and screams echoing across the pine tops. 7 hands, 49 positions, 2401 ecstasies, …
A Hair from the Fixer that Bit Him
Donald Trump demands loyalty from all those strolling around his wandering hands, but he gives out loyalty to no one except his daughter, Ivanka, his gold-striped leather wallet and extra-long silk necktie, and the right half of one of his …
Rocking the Globe From DC
The cops have boarded up the demonstration’s central planning space & roped off entire downtown Sunday DC yet, after Seattle, they and we believe there is magic enough …
2001 Skies
July 1st, Canada Day, once again sit morning meditation facing out Vivian’s forest cabin window today lower back muscles ache, I squirm in chair seeking comfort, watch a thin trail of smoke rise from sage incense …
McNamara’s Ghosts
The Best & Brightest were neither It wasn’t only a Battleship they steered wrong They looked up at Dawn’s Slippery Sky and cried “Ours” Thought a nation’s most sacred trees could be tortured into spying Feared the Creaky Springs of …
45th Birthday in 2002
Turned 45 while low back spasmed first time in few months– body getting old, but at least concepts of life becoming clearer: everyone on planet has 3 basic needs: material (food, water, shelter, medical, solid spot of …
Who Does What To Whom
These questions of who does what are of little import now— the facts are we continued to have a great public life but our private one began suffering & you had the courage to leave. Why the top floor of …
What I Think Historians Will Say in 20 Years about the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election
I. September 2016 How crazy it was that America’s elders nominated the two most unpopular major-party candidates in U.S. history. On the Democratic side, a corporate-lensed centrist wife of a former president in a country founded on revolt against idea …
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After Seeing Bernie Sanders Win the New Hampshire Democratic Presidential Primary
After nine difficult health years dealing with Lyme disease and neck surgery, I lived long enough to see the first democratic-socialist in my lifetime win a major political party’s presidential primary. What a night it is to …
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