2. 60 seconds

Challenge (PJS) :

A poem that lasts EXACTLY* one minute to read out / perform. In 60
hours you must write and record yourself performing it (audio or
visually or PREFERABLY* both). Can be about anything.

* - sorry to shout


JMB : 

PJS : 

1. Edward Snowden

Challenge (JMB):

write a poem for / against / inspired by / ignoring Edward Snowden etc.

we have 48 hours to comply (more like 60)

i was just reading about him & i think it must be weird & exciting & frightening being him. & i thought what can i possibly do about this state that the world is in, and it occurred that all i can do is either write a poem about it or not. 

so tomorrow i'm going to write a poem about him.  you should do too.  then, in a little while, it's someone else's turn to decide what we have 48 hours to write a poem about. 

if you choose not to comply, you are struck from the register.

nb. this does not count as my poem, or yours.

JMB :

one can consider one’s self important

you can imagine it and only think

someone’s studied my metadata and concluded

well, there’s a man who’s achieved more than

he lets on. one naturally exceeding

most, and young too, comparatively, having done

stuff that interests generations. but it amounts to

twice what we never did and rolling

out down the years. that otherness stacked

up in Hong Kong or Moscow, queueing for

its hit of difference, freed of duty like

cigarettes in an airport somewhere, looking

so dangerous. one of the truths is we are

sheepish and stubborn, throwing ideas out

as they’re encountered, tidal pools slipping

into a broader ocean, let’s all pretend

that our e-mails and our privacies matter, and

a simple net exists to catch them in, that

our selves can be copied away. i doubt

we have even a faint clue, and just stop trying

therefore to guess more. yet i kno we should work

to turn the practical into something moral.

one of our hopes is to persuade ourselves

to be something we’re not and let them watch


PJS :

So then the case of Mr Snowden can anyone really deny him asylum for uncovering the fact that the internet is being spied on by governments and nations not just on special occasions but all the time even this rhyme might appear on some monitor that shows Eastern Daylight Time at the bottom right hand corner of some spook’s screen or be passed through an American algorithm machine like free thinking blood through an eavesdropping spleen

Surely at least most of us realise that information is power and what a surprise powerful people want to perpetuate powerful lies where the Great Firewall of China blinkers its citizens’ eyes the West seems to leave it’s gates open wide for inquisitive minds to search and speak out about what they find and it’s this freedom that the NSA mines not the information itself but the momentum of the lines that navigate, intersect and educate these multimedia times

But we’re losing track of Mr Snowden and we need to get a hold on this whole situation of why shared information should not be treated as treason the reason being that if it’s okay for the powers that be to have access to the emails and social media of you and me then why can’t we strive to ask for the same amount of transparency and the irony here is I’m not annoyed that they may be snooping on me I'm annoyed at how annoyed they are when their secrets are freed in much the same way that they have been freeing mine from me

So let’s protect Mr Snowden who’s risking his life let’s shout from the rooftops “I’m Edward Snowden and so’s my wife!” let’s hide in politician’s wardrobes and record what they say let’s bring type writers to the library and all not use the internet for one whole day let’s buy everyone a whistle and synchronise our blows so that everyone knows where we stand which is behind this man who took on the land of the free but in doing so put his life in jeopardy let’s all fly to Moscow and make it clear that he will never be alone not in his mission, not in the world and not in the International Airport Transit Zone

RDJ : 

I don't have a poem. While my fellow human is hounded for speaking truth to the powerless, I have been using the freedoms others gave their lives to secure for me to sit in the park and play dulcimer. Hopefully the Cubans will take him in.