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let yours be heard e-mail admin@thesoulofno.com and your comments
will be posted here.
sent her away with notions of return
separation meets devastation hard lessons learned
wore her love like armor
but still it couldn't protect me from the water
from the slaughter from the 2000 souls now turned martyrs
fathers separated from daughters, sons, and loved ones
while outcome remains unclear
as fear finds freedom and flesh becomes weak
no words to speak no arms to reach no
notions of peace or shadow of light in darkness of night
just silence then sirens then shots
search for sanity between helicopter drops
whiteflags on rooftops nightmares on streetcorners the night the bowl finally filled with water
yet knowing shes somewhere safe helps me plot my escape
from the only place I call home the only life I knew as my own
the only love that keeps me strong but now moves on
and no song or poem could whether this storm or bring her back home
and even though the love remains so does the pain and the strain
down came the rain on my city and my soul - soulmate left out in the cold
freedom put on hold from national guard and national neglect
no life could ever be replaced by a FEMA check
SBA cant loan me a lifetime of memories so lets reflect on whats next in this 40 year pattern
old fashioned ethnic cleansing and we keep letting it happen
Brandi "Divine Lyricis" Fleury
New Orleans native, Published Author, Poet, Teacher,
Restauranteur
My pen finds no comfort from the page. I fight to find
the words to describe what Hurricane Katrina and our
government has done to our lives. Every time I begin, I
take long pauses to compose myself and write through
the tears. I am full of anger, resentment, and outrage.
I am absolutely disgraced at every aspect of
government, whether Federal, State, or local.
Incompetence, infidelity, and greed have caused many
of our leaders to corrupt themselves openly. “If you
depend on the government then you will be
disappointed every time,” said Bill O’Reilly. From Bill
Clinton to Richard Nixon, our leaders, who are
supposed to be an example of honor and
responsibility, neglect even their own conscience. But
nothing was a better example of incompetence than
our current Mayor, our current Governor, and our
current President. The slowness of our government
to react to a people who remained a starving people, a
dying people, an impoverished people, and a people
who elected them into office, for days on end is
unacceptable. These same people should take the
words of the poet Sunni Patterson to heart and
“remember the water, remember the slaughter,
remember the bones at the bottom.”
Our city will never be the same again. The stories that
I’ve heard from emotionless faces are painfully etched
forever in my mind. I am amazed and saddened by the
many officers and deputies that abandoned their post.
I am angered by the media’s reporting on rumors and
insufficient facts. Along with many other “refugees”, I
am angrily waiting on FEMA’s assistance and back
Unemployment checks, financial aid refunds, and a
job. Like many other US citizens, I would like to see
our incompetent leaders resign. I would like to see
New Orleans resuscitated and breathing. Like many
survivor’s, I want reparations. Like many other New
Orleanians I have, “a will to rebuild” and fight to make
New Orleans home once again.
Sage Nasiha
New Orleans native, Proprietor Wize Wordz productions,
member of the Southern Cypher Artist Co-operative,
Curator of the Treme Community Garden, oldest
African-American neighborhood in the United States.
Throughout these past two months I have seen and
heard of many relief and benefit functions for storm
survivors. What they do not add to their promotional
material is how can the storm survivors receive funds
raised from all of these benefits. That's a problem to me.
The main issue that we face as a people is depending
on the government, established institutions, and
organizations to do for us. We as activist in our
community did not make protecting our communities
from flooding because of a weak levee system a high
priority. Knowing that, we as activist did not make
hurricane preparation and evacuation a high priority in
our communities because money intended for the levees
were diverted to other projects. Now is the time to
transfer our energy from seeking relief to establishing a
black economic base - more responsible black
businesses. Many other ethnic groups prosper because
of family based businesses. We as a people need to
become more financially responsible. It is a fact that
blacks are the number one consumers in America, and
one indicator of how the economy is doing is by
monitoring consumer spending. Of course this spending
is an outflow from our communities into the hands of
people that do not recycle or make sizeable investment
back to where the profits were made. As much as we
spend on partying and materialism, there is no reason
why so many of our people suffered during this
catastrophe. I do hold the government responsible for
not doing the job taxpayers hired them to do. We can
not wait to untangle the beauracracy of government
while our people suffer. We have the power. We have
to stop playing the victim role and take control of our
lives, families, and communities. We are the creators of
civilization and now we act the most uncivilized.
