Rachel Aliene Corrie (April 10, 1979 – March 16, 2003) was an American peace activist and a member of the pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement. She was crushed to death while trying to stop an Israeli Defense Forces armored bulldozer from demolishing Palestinian homes in Rafah, in the occupied Gaza Strip. This poem is dedicated to her, in memoriam.)
Barely a woman, twenty three years old–
Soft, vulnerable…. Surely, the Monster
Will stop in its tracks!
She steels her will,
Thinks of the tank in Tiananmen Square–
One little man stopping a tank!
Surely,
They will perceive her love-resolve:
To die in a great cause is to mortar–
Not martyr–the Cause!
She must not die!
Cannot break her parents’ hearts–
Back home! (She sees them now!)
If only they knew
How she had grown!
They would understand…
This other love that held her now
In place, this love of home and place,
And the Other,
Of the faces, the voices, the laughter…
Olive groves and sun-scented skin;
The love she’d found for dispossessed:
Children, fathers, mothers–also of her,
Belonging to her, because
Everyone suffering was One.
It was hard to explain… but the Monster
Truck was coming now–remorseless Caterpillar,
Sci-fi bulldozer to scoop her up!
It would stop in its tracks!
Because a man drove it!
A man who would see her,
In her orange jacket
Like a bumble bee!
He would see she had to
Do it—stand there in its way
(Though its iron mouth gaped,
Though its hard lips snarled.)
To save their houses, olive groves… to save
Herself! And these other selves–part of her
And part of the one who drove the Monster
Closer now, with droning, cacophonous,
Tank-like clanking,
And the sun burning its panes like eyes.
Surely
It must stop, if she steels her will, is resolute,
Peers in his eyes… surely… then… understand…
He will–the suffering… the children… why she stood
In its way–
Barely a woman, bones against
The iron tread, encircling,
Winding, crushing, crackling,
Bursting in sunburst light,
In the dying light,
For the sake of all.
(for Rachel Corrie; first published at Transcend Media Service, 2017)
Gary Steven Corseri has taught in US public schools and prisons, and at US and Japanese universities. His prose and poems have appeared at Countercurrents, Counterpunch, Village Voice, The New York Times, Redbook Magazine, and hundreds of other periodicals and websites. His dramas have been produced on Atlanta-PBS and elsewhere, and he has performed his work at the Carter Presidential Library and Museum. His books include novels, and the poetry volume, “Random Descent” (Anhinga Press). He can be contacted at [email protected].
