Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Variation on a Theme by Milosz Misquoted by Robert Hass, Bradley Harrison Smith

VARIATION ON A THEME BY MILOSZ MISQUOTED BY ROBERT HASS                    
                                    Lunch Poems Reading Series, Berkeley 2004


O to see through teargas!  The color flash grenade—
            wait—
O to see through teargas the flash grenade transfigure what was once
in colored Oakland the flooded street ablaze!

The numbing quiet spilled from flesh the stun grenade
ripped open.  O molten scent of what it stung—
________________________
About "Variation on a Theme by Milosz Misquoted by Robert Hass," Bradley Harrison Smith writes:
This poem is written after a Robert Hass reading in 2004 in which he attempted to recite a translation of Czeslaw Milosz by memory but messed up and had to restart.  It is dedicated to Scott Olsen, the former Marine and Iraq War vet who sustained a skull fracture in the Occupy Oakland protests due to police brutality.

2 comments:

  1. Maybe reading poetry can help lower car insurance? I don't know, actually.

    ReplyDelete