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The Winter Games Go On

Although detainees must sleep in cramped cells on cement floors,
and though they must wear shackles with their numbered uniforms,
and though repression crosses Xinjiang’s pale locked-down sky,
the corporate industrial complex won’t bat an eye.

Although Hong Kong was once a base of civil liberties,
and though the communists crush those who want democracy,
and though the people now are jailed, practicing free speech,
the corporate industrial complex won’t say a thing.

So now in Beijing, the Olympic Winter Games go on,
supported by Proctor & Gamble, Visa and Bridgestone,
Intel, Allianz, Coca Cola, and Airbnb…
The IOC states it will be still aired by NBC.

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Bruce Dale Wise is a poet currently residing in Texas. 

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4 Responses

  1. BDW

    I did think of dedicating the poem to Mr. Robin, because of his devotion to exposing the brutality of the Chinese communists. I certainly agree with him that the “naming of names” in the poem is important both historic’lly and poetic’lly.

    As to the meter of the poem, it is iambic heptameter; however, as Mr. Robin sensed, there are metrical variants, some noted in the poem’s next published places with accents and hyphens; however, L10, on the other hand, has two alterations from exact meter: Proctor & Gamble and Bridgestone, which I have purposefully allowed.

    The Winter Games Go On
    by Lu “Reed ABCs” Wei
    “Nobody cares what’s happening to the Uighyrs.”
    —billionaire Chamath Palihapitiyah

    Although detainees must sleep in cramped cells on cément floors,
    and though they must wear shackles with their numbered uniforms,
    and though repression crosses Xinjiang’s pa-le-locked-down sky,
    the corporate industrial compléx won’t bat an eye.

    Although Hong Kong was once a base of civil liberties,
    and though the communists crush those who want democracy,
    and though the people now are jailed, practicing free speech,
    the corporate industrial compléx won’t say a thing.

    So now in Beijing, the Olympic Winter Games go on,
    supported by Proctor & Gamble, Visa and Bridgestone,
    Intel, Allianz, Coca Cola, and Airbnb…
    The IOC states it will be still aired by NBC.

    Lu “Reed ABCs” Wei is a poet of New Millennial China. Other companies include Alibaba, Atos, Dow, General Electric, Omega, Panasonic, and Toyota.

    Reply
    • Evan Mantyk

      Dear Bruce, thank you for the poem. I agree with Damian. The naming of names is a powerful part of this poem. In particular, the repetition of most of line 4 in line 8 and then the total crystalization of it, without repetition, in line 12 is brilliant.

      Reply
  2. BDW

    Both the poet and the reader will like and dislike different aspects of a work. While I appreciate Mr. Mantyk’s keen eye for the architecture of the dodeca, what I liked most about L12 was its internal rhyme, its pois-on-ed inversion, and its acronymic links.

    A News Balladic Composition
    by Bard Eucewelis

    A news balladic composition, like dodeca, is
    a compact passing in elastic, like a cross-bow’s whizz.
    Although it’s rhythmic verse that’s suitable for singing songs,
    in prose, it goes along, a flock of words in winging throngs.

    Like as an albatross that rises high into the sky;
    it’s there a moment, then it’s gone before one says good-bye.
    It vanishes, as it appears—abruptly—melts into…
    the sea, the sky…one sees a white cloud vaporize in blue.

    O, what was there? a simple air, light as a tune by Bach,
    as if it wasn’t where it was, and it could not be caught,
    that rides the storm above the archer’s range, but cannot walk,
    because of giant wings the ancient mariner hath wrought.

    Reply

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