This is the blog for the Bentari Project.
Friday, July 08, 2016
“There is something haunting in the light of the moon; it has all the dispassionateness of a disembodied soul, and something of its inconceivable mystery…. and gives a sinister reality to shadows alone.” (Joseph Conrad, Lord Jim , chapter 24) Bentari’s introduction to war spans a few days and nights. During the nights, gathering clouds and a gibbou...
Read full postTuesday, July 05, 2016
From Bentari , chapter 14 “A Tribe of Orphans,”—Chief Mankani contemplates the lonely, dire straits of leadership when battle looms. Alone on the savanna, his tribe’s lot consumes him—their history, their future and the prospects for war that menace tomorrow. Suddenly, his demeanor changes rapidly when, “…the gibbous moon shone down upon the joyful...
Read full postWednesday, June 29, 2016
I see the moon. The moon sees me. The moon sees the one I want to see. God bless the moon. And God bless me. God bless the one I want to see. Mother sang the lullaby as we drove along Highway 26, west through the mountains, beneath the Milky Way. On our way to the beach, we sang songs. Dinah blew her horn. Old MacDonald had a farm. Boats were rowed...
Read full postFriday, June 24, 2016
Solstice Visions [1] Deserted cliff dwellings whistle loud and clean over geological time eroded dreams remain the wadi runs through dry rock bed land wailing away under silent stars and moon Coyote serenade eternal landscape crawls away snake skeletons in sand bony clean remains where eskers sprinted glaciers rushed land thirst slaked quenched by ...
Read full postMonday, May 30, 2016
Illustration by Matt Rota. On Memorial Day, we honor the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and volunteer soldier Delmer Berg—its last survivor has died. 2,800 Americans risked death to battle the forces of Fascism in the Spanish Civil War[1] (1936-1939). More than 700 Americans were killed during the war. They were selfless; they were brave. They put persona...
Read full postTuesday, May 17, 2016
Father Daniel Berrigan went to Hanoi during wartime in 1968. He wrote this poem: BOMBARDMENT Like those who go aground willfully, knowing our absurd estate can but be bettered in the battering hands of the gods— Yet mourning traitorously the sun and moon, beloved faces and heat of hearth— Went under like a blown match. The gases flare on the world’...
Read full postWednesday, May 11, 2016
Where’s the man more committed to peace? Where’s the man more tightly bound in telling and living the truth? Was there ever a man less afraid of his government than the teacher, the priest, the poet, the activist—Father Daniel J. Berrigan? No! It was he—he was that man! Kurt Vonnegut Jr. called him “Jesus as a poet” and followed by saying, “If this...
Read full postSunday, May 08, 2016
Of the multitude of motherly qualities that we cherish, providing safety for the young is right at the top. Mothers nurture safety. They cling to it tenaciously. Mothers provide our first warmth. Our sustenance begins in her womb, flows from her breast and infuses us with the safe inner havens we all need to go forth and to be productive. If there ...
Read full postTuesday, May 03, 2016
In the 1964 film “Behold a Pale Horse,” [1] aftermath from the Spanish Civil War hovers over a handful of exiled rebels who had fought for democracy but lost. They continue to struggle. It is 20-years after the rebels’ defeat in 1939. General Franco’s fascist dictatorship has settled in like a foul and heavy mist. The story builds to its inevitable...
Read full postSunday, May 01, 2016
When did humans begin celebrating May Day? Well, celebrations in the spring were called Floriala by ancient Romans, and called Walpurgisnacht by Germanic people, and called Beltane by the Celts in Stonehenge times. The old celebrants honored flowers in new bloom, the banishment of winter witches and the return of summer. These were times of great i...
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