HUMANS

(After reading many of the books kept in the cave, Jeremiah wrote in his notebook)

Capable of the most honorable deeds
and the cruellest actions
contradictory beings —
creators of art and music yet
warmongers destroyers of lives,
builder of cities, gardens, parks …
effacers of forests and rivers
conservationists some, rapists others
philosophers and tyrants
free thinkers and demagogues
humanitarians and racists
scientists and murderers
All part of this mélange
we call the human race.

 ** 

JEREMIAH AND CAMUS

Jeremiah lived
chained to a past
in a golden cage
his life an absent presence
which was like drowning
in a dry lake in one of
Jupiter’moons.

He swam on sand
flew on fire
burned on sky.

Jeremiah wrote poems
to the gold that muted him
and his words became ashes
grey and black petals
like from the tree of death.

Jeremiah had read about Camus in one of the books in the cave. He thought he would like to talk to him and say: “Albert, I am a prisoner of my own mind.” He imagined that Camus would have said: “Embrace the absurd and search for meaning.”

 **

NO LIGHT

Far from everything, the ethereal now
where Jeremiah, imagined himself
fighting the forces of the present.
He asked himself a question: “Why could I not
ignore the abuse and the deceit, living life
as before, happy deflowering virgins?”

I could have answered you, Jeremiah. You found
those pieces of papers glued together,
with symbols that made your synapses fire.
Those are books, treasures that opened your mind.

He wanted the truth to be handed to all.
Digesting his anger, he prepared a speech
for The Great Code Keeper incinerator of knowledge,
his words a call to awaken the ignorant populace,
those who sell their daughters forced to procreate
those who despise The Mutants.
Perhaps I don’t need words, he thought
I need an army with guns and swords
but then, blood inundated his head, red to his core
he realised he was thinking like the people of the past
who killed not only lives but also hope. Embarrassed,
he cried, kneeled on Mother Earth and kissed the ground
as the Pigeons had taught him when he had done wrong.
In a tenuous voice the young man asked for forgiveness.

 —————————— 

 Vivid world building: Richard James Allen launches The Book of Jeremiah by Beatriz Copello

Dr Beatriz Copello is a well-known reviewer, writer and poet, she is also known for her sense of humour. “Her poems are sensuous, evocative and imaginative. Beatriz Copello is one of Australia’s foremost poets,” wrote Julia Hancock, Ex-Editor of Allan and Unwin and Freelance editor and journalist. Copello’s poetry books are Women Souls and Shadows, Meditations at the Edge of a Dream, Flowering Roots, Under the Gums Long Shade, Lo Irrevocable del Halcon and Renacer en Azul (In Spanish), Witches Women and Words, Rambles and No Salami Fairy Bread. Her poetry has been published in literary journals such as Southerly and Australian Women’s Book Review and in many other print and Electronic Publications. Fiction books by author are: A Call to the Stars, Forbidden Steps Under the Wisteria and Beyond the Moons of August (Her Doctoral Thesis).