photograph of one who stands different
(flash fiction challenge--the photograph reacted to is at Melissa's site, link below)
she’d like to talk
I think
she has things to say
and has invested in earth colors
and a visible presence
in a crowd
inside a city
who might keep her from talking?
well
she’s surrounded by black forms
hoods
perhaps hijabs like hers
(though hers is kindly brown)
and on the other side
black uniforms
of police
who also wear
visors hard to see through
and though we cannot see them
there must be weapons
somewhere
she has no actual platform
for her platform
there is a sign close by
she might be holding it
ironically
it says
SILENCE IS VIOLENCE
because
well
it is
silence is violence
if the silence is words
frightened
or (otherwise) brutalized
away from utterance
out of consideration
for fear of weaponry
arrest
and isolation
which would
once again
be silence
and this is a message
to the rest
that keeping silent
is through indifference
or only taciturn
approval
a kind of violence
in and of itself
we let it happen
let the wrong things happen
or keep
the right words
the protest words
the revealing words
get out
it’s like the leave to vote
and then
not bothering
infantilizing values
of democracy
her mouth is covered
I don’t know if
from cultural requirement
protection
from infection
or to illustrate her point
she is not tall
which is to say
everyone is taller
all around her
though she (or whoever)
holds the sign high
higher than everyone
to make her point
and maybe find
an invitation
to speak out
from up higher
sometime
she is not subjugated
yet
she’s there
she’s standing
and the sign is standing
not to mention
that the line
of her suit jacket
sends a message
of some fashion
something lined
through razored words
through silence
after all
the eyes are windows
clearly open
though the message
of a moment
might need more
some exchange
some blinking
we could get
from being there
but she needs to talk
everyone there
everyone here
needs to hear
and heed
what she has to say
the need is ours
outside the frame
to find her
and the source of words
and more
in principle
and action
to take away
C L Couch
(for) Melissa’s Flash Fiction Challenge #249
https://melissalemay.wordpress.com/2024/01/01/melissas-fandango-flash-fiction-challenge-249/
(tag #FFFC)
Photo by Priscilla Gyamfi on Unsplash
Chalk writing on the street near the George Floyd memorial in Minneapolis. "Together we will change the world."
(x = space)
x
x
The Violence
x
I guess nowadays
It seems to me
Not to wax
Not in a rant but with
Cold observation
x
A reader
And a hearer
And a watcher
x
We go to
Wicked without order
(yes, we know it’s good
in New England)
No vision
No plan
Make war not love
x
As if we’ve taken all the virtue
All the good things out of
Everything,
Which leaves us
(ask Oedipus
Creon
even Antigone)
Vanity
And hubris
A particular kind of cowardice
For bullying
An awful war
Frankly, an awful peace
x
On the inside first
Then interpersonal
x
Having arranged
For all of us
By all of us
Easy access to deadlier weapons
Lacking safeties
And restraints
And moderation
x
Intentions once machined
To the center
Now lathed
At a slant
Until the work breaks
In the machine
Our better parts left
Ragged
Rough
Deadly points
Untreated
Left unsmoothed
x
And then the other weapons
Too easy
x
C L Couch
x
x
Antigone. Ismene, dear sister,
You would think that we had already suffered enough
For the curse on Oedipus:
I cannot imagine any grief
That you and I have not gone through. And now—
Have they told you the new decree of our king Creon?
(Antigone by Sophocles)
x
Photo by Amber Kipp on Unsplash
x
Painting by Numbers
(pandemicism)
I’m unsure what to say about
Those who die today
Saluting nothing
No cause but the spread of a disease
We will number them
We’ll try
Then we’ll try to
Turn them into issues
On platforms
Of lies,
Of anything but names and
All the parts
Of lives
That some carried
And bear now
C L Couch
Photo by Pierre Bamin on Unsplash
clcouch123 
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