Terminator

[vaneramos]

Our gods of earth
swell in glass heaven
removed from filth
where vanquished
farmers must sow
Monsanto seeds.
The bone blades clatter
in chemical wind
bearing us
zombie food.

Banish heirlooms.
Deny all inheritance
from the land.

Our gods of earth
play Darwin
stringing dead beads
in the strands of life.
It spreads infertile rumours
over hill and wave
til fibres weave
throughout the web
and hybrid children are born
with a patent
burnt on their foreheads.

Comments

[kwintt.livejournal.com]

Wonderfully written. And I heartily agree. I am a seed saver myself. I collect heirloom treasures ... green beans, romaine lettuce, brandywine tomatoes, black beauty eggplants, plump green peppers. Squashes and fat red onions. I dry the seeds and save them all until the next spring's planting. Monsanto is the devil's spawn, I am sure of it.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Karen. This poem was inspired by a couple of article danthered referenced in his journal during the past couple weeks:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/021005X.shtml

http://globalresearch.ca/articles/KHA501A.html

I don't have a garden anymore, but when I did Brandywine tomatoes were one of my favourite crops. There's a community garden nearby, and I'm considering starting a plot this spring.

[kwintt.livejournal.com]

Van, I encourage you to follow through on that notion and to plant a spring crop. Not only will you have wonderful, virtually free organic produce but you'll enjoy camaraderie of other like minded folks. I think that artists and gardeners are some of the nicest people one ever meets.
I am about to start some seedlings indoors now so that they will be ready for transplanting in March when the ground has warmed up. If I tried to plant them outside now, they'd just languish and maybe not germinate at all. You have given me the idea to draw my seed nursery one day ...

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

You're so lucky, planting out in March! Where do you live? Here in Ontario it isn't safe to transplant tomatoes until May 24.

[kwintt.livejournal.com]

My goodness, you do have a short season up north there don't you?
I'm in Southern California so we have it a lot easier.
We can garden year-round. Lettuces, peas and chard in the coldest months, and then summer vegetables go in starting around March, although they don't really take off until April or May, and don't bear until June. From June to November we essentially eat all our our fresh produce from the garden and "orchard," if you can call an avocado tree, three peaches, a lemon tree and one dinky orange tree an "orchard." We also grow grapes, strawberries and blackberries, each in their season. Of course, the water probably costs as much to provide as the fruit would if purchased in the store, but I know that nothing is sprayed ...

I wrote about orange trees in my latest LJ post (with a painting) if you want to see a little more about So. Cal. growing.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

You're living a dream I had for many years. Although our growing season is short, it seems like things grow faster here, I suppose because we have longer daylight hours in summer. I would have lettuce and chard by the end of June, peas by the first week of July. I look forward to enjoying your garden. I'm going to catch up on my friends page now. :-)

[daisydumont.livejournal.com]

wow, that's strong! what great images. and how scary.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's scary, and inspired by actual stories I read about Monsanto recently. Check the comment above yours if you're interested.

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

Fantastic.

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Cat.

[poetbear.livejournal.com]

nicely done, Van.~paul

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Paul.

[poetbear.livejournal.com]

yvw~p