Memorial Day 2009 Poem by Alexandre Nodopaka

Today I filmed the sound of waterfalls
and photographed an Old Glory Stars and Stripes
planted on the topmost branch of a tall tree
and I wrote a mystical poem in the manner of Gibran.
Then off my shoulder I flicked
straight into the lake a few stray scouting ants

and with my hand swept off some spider webs
stretched against my view of eternity
and I finally let my sight rest.
Having read earlier several poems by a different poet
who was fixated on the eternal
I included the same point of interest when writing mine.

Again today but somewhat later I went back
to film that same standard waving in the ether
and it made me think of the soldiers that also
were waved good byes and since I didn't have to fight
permitted me this peace of mind allowing me to write
about the waste of wars.

Today I immersed in trying to understand
the mystique of the drawings by that Syrian poet
and only vaguely received enlightenment.
I should've saved the spider web and sighted the
explanation through its calligraphic heart
in the ways the Koran is illuminated.