You say we can’t Trump tariffs then?
The bronze one did reply:
You’re going to have to pay the price
Go on, Canada, try.
***
Our Kingdom come, My Will be done
I always get my way
Your oil may flow, your trees may grow
But still you’ll have to pay.
***
Perhaps I bluff, perhaps I don’t
But I’ll decide the price
For Canada, please don’t forget
That I’m not very nice.
About the Creator
Marie McGrath
Things that have saved me:
Animals
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Sense of Humor
Writing
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Love Letters Through Time
Context: Grace (Gráinne) Gifford, was a participant in the Irish nationalist struggle against British rule, which led to ‘The Easter Rising’, Easter Monday, 1916 in Dublin, Ireland. She was betrothed to one of the leaders, who were due to be executed the morning after being taken prisoner. Joseph and Grace were married the night before in his prison cell. Joseph (Seosamh Pluinceid)) was one of the leaders of The Rising, a signatory of the Irish Proclamation and, in death, a revered Irish hero. These are my imaginings of ‘her’ final words to him. I include a few words in Irish Gaelic as the movement that led to the rebellion favored speaking Irish, instead of English. I would wager a guess, as they were both poets and writers in the Irish republican movement that she would have chosen to marry her love of country with her love of him in expressing her devotion.
By Marie McGrathExclusive • 12 months ago
Foot Bindings
I asked my grandmother how she knew she'd fallen in love. I am not sure I ever did love him, she said. This was before I met my husband. I was naive, a naked spring, a raw nerve of a thing. That cannot ever be me, I knew. Sadness swept in gently like a Moscow thaw. It is no simple thing, looking into a woman's vast soul and seeing its foot bindings. Now, in Italy divorced with my skin singed off, when I say I don't love him mean: I have succeeded at feeling nothing most days and it mostly works. Do you want the comfort of Nothing? Do you want Nothing, too? Be warned: you'll never be free, even when you are nothing. Here is what doesn't work: Accepting the stages of grief. Talking about it. Sitting with the feeling. Missing him—no, the person you were when you believed in death do us part. Writing poetry. That, too. When I say I don't love him I mean: I feel capsized in an endless, starved tide. What sometimes works: selective memory. You must forget ripe tomatoes and his beard and feeling perfectly sheltered in a big blue world. Forget coffee in bed, laughter watching TV, blowing out the candles on the birthday cake and the quiet all-encompassing knowledge that you are chosen. Remember only how love turned to a banal everyday survival act, a trapeze act unsure whether he will catch you, how the warmth stagnated and became sour, remember the foot bindings and remember the resentment boiling in your veins as you stick it out for the kids. Six-hour Netflix binges help, too. A man's fingers tracing your spine. Frozen pizza at 2 a.m. Random trips to the museum just to stand near things that last a while. The realization that crying won’t change anything. Seeing that life is just a dream, and refusing to participate in your own suffering. Bite your fist. Walk on eggshells around joy. When I say I don't love him, I mean he didn’t break my heart, he just stopped touching it and it forgot how to beat right.
By Ella Bogdanova6 days ago in Poets
Comments (1)
This poem hit a nerve. Have to agree, as a Canadian just recovering from Covid, the impending price increases from added tariffs are alarming. For my entire life, I enjoyed not feeling our neighbor is an enemy. I am not politically savvy, but now I am starting to more sincerely and authentically sympathize with how the Ukrainians feel about imposing neighbours and tariffs combined with threats of takeovers by possible violent means. I do hope the checks and balances of the democratic system will uphold the principles - at least those that I can understand-- of the American constitution. My hopes are based on respecting those who had fought in the Great wars as allies - and recognizing the repeating the dangers of gaining power at any cost. I would like to see America great again - without global trade wars that threaten and hurt. I expect better.