Betting On Oil Futures Poem by Terence George Craddock (Spectral Images and Images Of Light)

politics is like that
22 April 2011 Friday
Syrian security forces
opened fire on civilians

President Bashar al-Assad
issued more kill orders
another 72 Syrians shot
in at least 20 towns cities

Assad political protest unrest
now five long bloody weeks old
bloodiest repression poorest
suppressed suburbs Damascus?

plainclothes police security forces
fired directly live ammunition teargas
on peaceful demonstrator thousands
carrying freedom hope olive branches

in Douma and Zamalka calling for
fall of Ba'ath Party and freedom
but some foolishly ripped down posters
of President al-Assad toppled statutes

of his father former president
Hafez al-Assad who leveled
city of Hama 30 years ago
ruthless crushing Islamist revolt

like father like son rule by gun
Syrian government sly blamed
demonstrations on foreign instigation
foreign networks Al Jazeera the BBC

on CIA catch phrase Islamist agitation
organizers of Friday's demonstrations
referred to protests as Great Friday
calling attention to a Christian celebration

Good Friday stressing unity between
Syria's religious ethnic populations
"one hand, one people, one heart, one goal"
an attempt to counter al-Assad warnings

unrest threatens to unleash sectarian
bloodbaths as seen in Iraq in wake of
US invasion's toppling Saddam Hussein
but social economic conditions confronting

masses of Syrian workers the poor fuel
further brave demonstrations a UN report
on poverty issued last September found
one out of every three Syrians lives below

poverty line two to three million are living
in extreme poverty youth unemployment
tops 30 percent market reforms increased
social inequality creating fortunes for an elite

close to gory al-Assad regime fast eroding
real wages of Syrian workers corruption
repression monopolization of political power
characterizing Ba'athist regime intolerable

drought poor infrastructure economic
deprivation hunger bellies urge new protests
US government Western European powers
issue slap stick statements deploring violence

but won't oust al-Assad or intervene
as in bad boy Gaddafi Libya consensus
view within Western elite ruling circles
an overthrow of Ba'athist government

could destabilize middle east entire region
whatever conflicts erupt al-Assad regime
is preferable to maintain a nice status quo
6 July 2011 Syrian protest killings rock on

governments continue clean blind eye policy?
An illegal Libyan no fly zone war continues
shoot down buildings pump out cheap sold oil
while Libyan infrastructure like Iraq is blown?


Source Article ‘Dozens killed in Syrian protests' by Bill Van Auken.
Copyright © Terence George Craddock