A Palestinian man walks
through a neighbourhood destroyed during the 50-day
Israeli offensive in Gaza: photo by Mahmud Hams/AFP via The Guardian, 25 October 2014
When all's taken
and nothing given
on the social margins
and night's falling
on the social margins
and night's falling
the sky darkening
into memory
the year turning
the fires coming out
earlier
across the water
traffic crawling
beyond the bay bridge
through the clouds
the lit up stadium
a bright electric worm
Palestinian boys stand near a fire in their home
which was destroyed during the Israeli offensive in the Shejaiya
neighbourhood of Gaza: photo by Mohammed Abed/AFP via The Guardian 18 October 2014
A Palestinian boy looks out of his family’s house
that witnesses said was badly damaged during the recent Israeli offensive: photo by Mohammed Salem/Reuters via The Guardian 18 October 2014
Of late it's been a real challenge getting down the steps into the roaring metal gameplay corridor, and once down there, to see much through the splash of headlights -- dark early now -- but off there, in the twinkling obscurity to the west, a huge illuminated scar on the night, the blazing spectacle of AT&T Park. Enough light to overcharge ten cities for, hidden line-item by hidden line-item. The ostentatious display of waste from our service provider put me in mind of that unpleasant term infrastructure; and of who gets to have infrastructure, who doesn't, and why.
ReplyDeleteYeah, so the home team owned by Safeway wins, and We're Number One, sort of, though that won't earn any discounts when we're the thirty-ninth person in line for the one open checkout station at Safeway, but hey -- you didn't really think those celebs sipping the top shelf vintages in the luxury boxes beneath the ten billion watts of superlighting ever saw the inside of a Safeway, anyway, do you now?
ReplyDeleteSo what's the connection.
In Gaza it's been raining a lot, the electric and water and sewer systems still aren't functioning and the weather isn't helping, of the part of humanitarian aid money that got anywhere near Palestine and was not used to pay off the administrative back bills of the PA not much is actually securing essential rebuilding materials for Gaza, in particular cement, and anyway the Israelis say the cement is going to be used in tunnels so must be interdicted, so when we do allow you to buy it, you must buy it from us, at our prices, and meanwhile, while you weren't looking, guess what? Bibi told us today we're having 2000 new settlement units in East Jerusalem! Oy! Such a contribution to peace in the region! Like the invention of gunpowder -- and didn't the Nobel Peace Prize come from that?
There is no connection.
Before the home half of the seventh, the camera cut to the really big flag above the even bigger Coke bottle, a latino Marine in full dress sang Gobbles Murka, and the Bolivian born woman who doesn't like Evo Morales, and whose military dad serves the Big Gringo doing Arab language work for US army intelligence, puddled up -- it was as though a timewarp had scrunched Montezuma back into Tripoli all over again, and then again, and then yet again as in some demented jingoistic reissue of Groundhog Day.
But... about that connection.
People forget what they don't want to remember, and the task gets a lot easier if they didn't want to know in the first place, so really weren't paying the slightest attention
In Khuzaa, a town the IDF fucked up beyond all recognition -- it was almost reminiscent of the Mekong backwater town "we" "destroyed in order to save it", way back when, except with these guys it was more like "destroy it in order to destroy it, plus leave obscene graffiti in the ruins for the schoolkids, because we can" -- the houses were all knocked down, pulverized and in their place now are pre-fab metal boxes -- which are already looking a lot like the future.
After a summer of horror, Gaza residents face winter in cramped shacks
Anyway, no worries. Gaza -- you're not interested. And us, what would there be for us to worry about? On the social margins? Hanging on the ropes, gasping? Are you kidding?