By Angelina Llongueras. Originally appeared at The Network of Spiritual Progressives, and read by the author at the Bradley Manning Support Event in San Francisco on 20 March 2011.

An Urgent Poem for Bradley Manning

I

We all saw those images in black and white,
The murdered, unarmed “civilians”,
Walking by,
The children,
That day,
in that street
in Baghdad.

A war where there’s only one army,
not two.
An army against ragged people that used to have an identity,
no more.
A privatized army to “transcend” legal barriers
That might hint at later responsibilities,
Like a well drafted contract
Written by a torture-advocating lawyer,
That will save money to his boss,
Like an agency usurping the place of a union
mediating the misery of the many,
saving money for their boss.

Those black, dirty waters.

But it wasn’t that …

What it was…

We all heard
that absurd dialogue above,
that cold,
indifferent,
vulgar
cruel…
dumb
video game
raging in those helicopters.

That shared
Bored
Detached
Racist
Contemptuous
Nightmare that demanded some “action”
and set in motion
the slaughter.

Those Iraqis,
like hundreds more,
thousands,
perhaps millions…
-They won’t be counted –
Happened to be turned
into targets
to be smashed,
into laying bulks
to be bled on the asphalt…

just a few more
in a numberless sea of bodies.

That speech in the helicopters…
Hadn’t we all heard it for months?
Hadn’t we all been contaminated ?
Didn’t we all live a certain measure
-much too big, against our will-
of the obscure world of the predators?

So effective,
basic,
cheap
a fantasy!

II

Sometimes truth too is like a fairy tale,
Only in brighter colors.

It comes in the shape of a young prince,
Blonde and blue eyed,
Brave, daring, hopeful,
with an innocent smile,
with a healthy manhood,
And eyes that spark
As he sees the lies.

A prince
who playfully
Joyfully
Even naïvely, you could say,
Decides
That those are people that die.

They are not enemies,
Targets,
Collaterals,
Evil
Creatures,
too cheap to worry about
Or mourn,
But people,
Like him,
And you
And I.

Yet this vision
is high treason.
He’s been trained to see otherwise
By the War Lords
That preside
This pillaged earth,
This engineered
realm of desolated poverty,
where an invisible few
Keep us all in isolated slumber
So our fear
Will make them rich.

Bradley Manning, our prince,
Knows the game
He’s put within,
But he trusts
There are ways to regain freedom.

Paths
that when we take
Can give us all a say
In the way
matters are dealt with.

He believes we must all know
What’s at stake
What has been hidden.

He believes we won’t turn our heads away
if we are given this place
Of knowledge.

And like all heroes do,
He knows he’s not alone
In his yearnings

He counts on our courage
And union,

He bets
On our dignity
As people

To act together
For peace,

For an end
To the shameless horror
That cuts lives
And livelihoods,
Families and homes,
Schools and hospitals,
And that shreds

Our own very soul,
In the name of money,
In the name of war.

This is the reason why the prince is in chains

III

This is an urgent poem, Bradley Manning,
And it must reach you,
It must reach the double sided ax,
The sacred space,
The center of the labyrinth,
The place
Where the flame is alive
And it may become
A forest of flames
A mountain afire
A city of light.

It must penetrate thick walls,
And conspiracies of silence
That cry in eloquent loudness
That the empire
Has no prisoners of conscience.

For they all
try to isolate your clarity.
And your clarity is also ours,
It belongs to us all,
we cannot afford to miss it.

This poem, Bradley Manning,
must enter your gut
And infuse it with power,
with every memory of joy
you must use
to retain your sanity,
so it gives you back the certainty,
That you won’t be left alone.

Can they suppress a silent mental song in your cell?

Use it as an invocation.
That it is your chainers,
Not you,
who have been isolated.
That it is them,
Not you,
who have created their damnation.

Your voice has sung too bright a song
Not to be heard
And acted upon.

Yet, you have been wounded for too long
By the five angled arrow
that poisons your hope with impunity,
with the same impunity
that murdered those people in Baghdad
and millions more
and stole the riches of your land
and my land.

The zombie-like bureaucracy of fear,
Clutches you in its claws.
And seeks to punish your will
with the threat of oblivion
with the threat of being turned into an empty shell
of your old joyful self.

Bradley Manning, I say your name
So you may hear me,
So I may also hear your voice
Soon.
It has too long been silenced.

I don’t care if your voice is darkened
By the long confinement,
By pain or pain-killers.
I need to hear it.
I need to see you in the light of day.
I need you to be free
Soon.

For your joy is mine and so is your hope
And they must be returned to you.
Soon.

I cannot live without them.
We cannot live without them.

This is the hour of the wolf.
Just as at dawn
Light rises and expands
Unobtrusively
And fades darkness away
So smoothly
You can hardly notice,
Your hope has risen and expanded
Our lives
And your freedom
Is a global volcano
Fuming.