Chicagoetry: Congress Wars

Congress Wars

Memory is the soil of imagination,
the womb of insight,
the crucible of enlightenment.

I have been lighted, lightened,
as by lightning, by revelation
(which rhymes with revolution).

Memory struck like silent lightning
in broad daylight, blasting the wee spire
of mind. As though from the divine.

I recall a black mayor
and an obstructionist city council.
I recall the elation

of breakthrough and the deflation
of response. I recall
the obstructionists insisting

they weren't racists.
I remember not believing them I
remember not believing them.

Things are different now.
This time perhaps it's a wee more complicated.
But memory insisted.

It resisted ignorance,
smacked me upside my dread.
It insisted I think about it.

So I'm thinking about it.

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J.J. Tindall is the Beachwood's poet-in-residence. He welcomes your comments. Chicagoetry is an exclusive Beachwood collection-in-progress.

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More Tindall:

* Book of poems: Ballots From the Dead

* Music: MySpace page

* Fiction: A Hole To China

* Critical biography at e-poets.net

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