KaoticGood logo
Calendar Bookings About Robert Karimi About KaoticGood Self (the remix) Audio/Video/Pics
Merchandise Words Film Production kaoticWorld Goodies Employment Links Contact Us
Photo
Prose
Poetry
Plays

a poem
in response to Michele Camarano’s La battaglia de Dogali, 1896

(or my war cry)
by robert karimi


inside a Roman Museum of Modern Art
within the confines of a huge wall-conquering wooden frame
lies the painting of
a man w/white hair dressed in white (the focus of the painting)
who holds his opponent’s spear.

the victorious white hair
prepares the final blow,
light shining on his clean
white uniform.
his medal w/blue ribbon a glow.
the white hair’s opponents
surround
the white uniformed patriots.

the opponents’ colors painted amongst the shadows.
the painter’s color-coded legend guides the seer
to who are the offenders:
africans, with
spears and animal-skinned shields,
who are the unadvanced in
warfare technology:
the losers of the arms race of their time.

their bodies bloodily strewn across
canvas.

one warrior
holds a
rifle stolen from a
dead white uniform.
his machete in the other hand.
he awkwardly
fires it
and kills his own man.
like Prometheus
he learns about friendly fire.

the shadows continue their ambush
and it looks grim
for the white uniforms
although
both sides wear death on their sleeve.

interrupting the chaos,
the holy light delivered straight from the grace of God
shines on them,
painted with non-immortal artist’s grand strokes.

how did the artist
get such a portrait?
where had he the time
to shape his focus?
wasn’t the chaos of death
too much
too overwhelming
to give him the time
to paint such a tale
of evil and good
so finitely shaped on the canvas?

shouldn’t the shades
be broad and crazed;

a cacophony of
color and blood,
dust and brush?
Jackson Pollack meets Guernica(?)

death knows no realism.
(the war
can only be a
tale of heroism
after.it has become nostalgia:
an event that can be consumed
for a political election
a studio exec’s paycheck
an artist’s creation
or a veteran’s sex life.)

or did the artist
lift himself
out of the reality?
stop.
objectively paint
the journalism
through his
prism of light?

the grandeur of the frame
and its place in this Modern Art Museum
loudly speaks
to
what a great man this artist must be
to see
savages stop being men

what a great man he must be
to watch golems
kill each other.

what a great man he must be
to not join the fight

or did he?
or is he
trying to stop

this
by
painting
this

he
makes
me
want
to
fight
against
what
he
paints.

to write this poem: my war cry.

because all the other words
seem pointless.
when i think of all this death
for a reason not even this artist on this canvas can explain
i want to cry.

for war
is the worst
of our creations,
no matter how we frame it.
11/2/01;2/01/02; 2/6/03; 4/21/03

© 2003 robert karimi

Click here for a printable version of this poem.