Thank you so much for reading with such care, and for sharing this anecdote. The way you and your friend unpacked the layered meanings of “peaceful” speaks so deeply to the tension this poem holds. I’m grateful for your presence here and for reminding us that even language can carry its own quiet violence.
I appreciate how this poem presents the question of what it means to be "a peaceful country". A couple days ago my friend and I were having a discussion about what "peaceful" even means. There was a group of people locally that had gathered around an ICE van to keep them from taking away two of our young people from a legal immigration check-in. The police ended up deploying tear gas, shooting some "non-lethal rounds", 30 people were arrested. My friend and I were frustrated that a peaceful protest was met in this fashion. Then you see people online urging that "this wouldn't have happened if the protest had stayed peaceful". My friend made a good point that for some of us, "peaceful" means nonviolent. For some others though, it seems to mean perfectly legal and not inconveniencing any other person or property. To me this poem suggests that the second definition of "peaceful" holds its own violence. Thank you for sharing this beautiful and thought-provoking poem.
We were asked to interpret a line in another Kaminsky poem during the 30-in-30 poetry month challenge:
https://zenmanship.substack.com/p/alcatraz-and-for-the-birds
Thank you so much for reading with such care, and for sharing this anecdote. The way you and your friend unpacked the layered meanings of “peaceful” speaks so deeply to the tension this poem holds. I’m grateful for your presence here and for reminding us that even language can carry its own quiet violence.
I appreciate how this poem presents the question of what it means to be "a peaceful country". A couple days ago my friend and I were having a discussion about what "peaceful" even means. There was a group of people locally that had gathered around an ICE van to keep them from taking away two of our young people from a legal immigration check-in. The police ended up deploying tear gas, shooting some "non-lethal rounds", 30 people were arrested. My friend and I were frustrated that a peaceful protest was met in this fashion. Then you see people online urging that "this wouldn't have happened if the protest had stayed peaceful". My friend made a good point that for some of us, "peaceful" means nonviolent. For some others though, it seems to mean perfectly legal and not inconveniencing any other person or property. To me this poem suggests that the second definition of "peaceful" holds its own violence. Thank you for sharing this beautiful and thought-provoking poem.
Thank you for posting this. So fitting for today unfortunately.
This isn't a poem I had come across, so thank you for introducing it to me.
I’ve always really loved this poem. Thank you for reminding me of it.