NVN Tuesday: Those At Risk — 2 Poems
“MY DEAD FRIEND’S SON POSTS FROM A BOMB SHELTER IN TEL AVIV” by Laurie Kuntz and “WHERE DO YOU GO TO DIE?” by Adele Evershed
MY DEAD FRIEND’S SON POSTS FROM A BOMB SHELTER IN TEL AVIV
by Laurie Kuntz
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I can remember you and your dad strolling the beach, crab hunting. I was close by teaching my son not to fear waves going over his head. You were both four—friends and schoolmates. As parents, we were only concerned with keeping sons safe and sane. When your family immigrated to Tel Aviv, I admonished your dad for taking you from a melting pot into fire. A mensch from Boston, bringing up a son by the beach would be enough for most. Three decades later, your dad is gone and you post ramblings of war from a bomb shelter, numbers of the missing, injured, and dead— Today your post is shorter, the news is the same the sirens—louder, the numbers—rising while the world becomes immune our gasps less forceful as we scroll down giving a thumbs up to blooming gardens, exotic recipes, and all that is coming soon to a theater near you. Anything to alleviate the burden of responsibility.
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Laurie Kuntz has published two poetry collections (The Moon Over My Mother’s House, Finishing Line Press and Somewhere in the Telling, Mellen Press), and three chapbooks (Talking Me Off The Roof, Kelsay Books, Simple Gestures, Texas Review Press, and Women at the Onsen, Blue Light Press). Simple Gestures, won the Texas Review Poetry Chapbook Contest, and Women at the Onsen won the Blue Light Press Chapbook Contest. Her 6th poetry book, That Infinite Roar, will be published by Gyroscope Press at the end of 2023. She has been nominated for three Pushcart Prizes and a Best of the Net Prize. Her work has been published in Gyroscope Review, Roanoke Review, Third Wednesday, One Art, Sheila Na Gig, and many other literary journals. She currently resides in Florida, where everyday is a political poem waiting to be written.
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WHERE DO YOU GO TO DIE?
by Adele Evershed
Liberal Democrat MP Layla Moran has said that she is "deeply worried" for her extended family in Gaza. Moran's mother is Palestinian and members of her family in Gaza are sheltering in a church after an Israeli missile struck their home. Speaking to the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire, she said: "No longer are people saying, where do we go to be safe? The question they are now asking is, where do we want to be when we die?" —BBC, October 29, 2023
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to the sea already so full of salt so you become part of the ebb and flow governed only by the mourning moon and any tears shed lost in the tumult of waves or crusted in the creases of a carcass left to rot on a far distant shore to a rowan tree already listing from the bombardment so you can nourish the roots that once nourished you and the redness of your screams can hang like a bloody reminder of all the things you were too young to see to the mountain top with its beguiling back story so your shallow breath can dovetail with the off white clouds and fall as gentle soaking rain delivering an absolution to those who have asked for none or do you simply pick up a stone and say… I will not die today
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Adele Evershed is a Welsh poet living in America. She has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Finishing Line Press published Adele’s first poetry chapbook Turbulence in Small Places in July. Her Novella-in-Flash Wannabe was published by Alien Buddha Press in May. Her second poetry collection The Brink of Silence is available from Bottlecap Press.
Beautiful and moving.