fools

by

board game…

fragmented promises
lie on the road
yesterday’s despairs
such fine confetti
for a parade
of fools
passing down
narrow cobblestoned alleys
of imagined liberties
to a destination
advertised by
online chatrooms
as the new eden
where free apples
are distributed
by secret police
for the consumption
of weary travellers
on this monopoly board
road to freedom

by

just a gypsy…

as she passed by in her traditional gypsy skirt
embroidered with sequins and coins
one man created an illusion of intimacy in his mind
while another said
beautiful yes…but she’s a 
  gypsy 
     exiled
     punishment
     harboring 
     jesus
     myth
   nazis
     systematic
     genocide
     concentration camp
     forced labor
     imprisonment
     extermination
     killed on sight
     einsatzgruppen 
     history’s largest
     mass murder
  after war
      assimilation schemes
      restrictions
      cultural freedom
      language
      and
      music
      banned
      labeled
      socially degraded stratum
      women sterilized
      state policy
had they but know her history
or that her love for country was as unconditional
as her beauty
they might have rethought their words
if not
then they are no more than fools
for seeing just a gypsy

Poem inspired by comments from http://jadepaloma.wordpress.com/