Enlightenment and Dissent

nullo discrimine

nullo discrimine

nullo discrimine

recent ancestors

have enjoyed carbonated beverages

soda water for flatulence

tonic water for the gin

rum and cola wars still pervade

moments of silence…

rather reflection

will fill this poem

in humility to the all

as priestley would prefer

as we yet in our current mad haste

traditionally post modernist

to redress, reinterpret, revise

re-invent the now rusted wheel

as it is ……… (silence)

let us celebrate

this legacy

as we gather in Birmingham

city of trades

where industry married art

bearing prosperity

this revolutionary one

was here …

for many moons(silence)

for enlightenment and dissent

reviled exiled his works publicly burnt

the mob relentless

destroyed his places of worship and work,

even his home hounded

by the press of London

caricatured as the priestly politician

or the political pries

this ideas as still ahead of our time

scientific pursuits for useless wars we still toil

terror occupies the survival space

of so many this is how we use chemistry

have we learnt any lessons1773-2004

cities besieged…nations in turmoil

disorder hunger an’ disease

ancestor priestley once

you too with your family were

refugees to America

as many today to the north

from the south the east and west

in search of a utopian sanctuary

their homes and families rent as

under

innocence maimed,

dismembered

sacred trusts trampled by religious bigotry

electricity is not global

but a commodity to the highest bidder

science is viewed in many quarters

with not covert suspicion

we still ferry as in horse-drawn fly boats

corroded dreams along silent canals

discarded machines survive

as forgotten ghosts

in the glare of neon lights

still empty warehouses

an overgrown silence

inviting vandals and addicts

productivity replaced by

determined vandalism

for carbon monoxide reigns

predominant now

forget the love of liberty

being a Jacobean

look today at Haiti

from where else America sourced the guns

just like those manufactured in Birmingham

to fight numerous wars an’ revolutions

but still the resilient priestley advises

restraint,

tolerance

in spite of adversity,

temperance

understanding

for the originators of civilisation

the fathers and mothers of the once

wretched slaves

for they too are humans

hence his work on the history

of the corruption of Christianity

is this humanity’s fate

should we like that mob

who burnt his book

prod along as the old Birmingham

groping in the shadow of Soho house

neglecting lessons of the past

on a full moon

as the gun revisits us in Aston

forgive galton we still eat chocolate

drink coffee,

smoke tobacco

fair traded or not

we, especially those of us

who can afford it

even contribute our daily share

of carbon monoxide

even our love for vegetation

has waned

yet priestley promised us a window

in this crisis

with suitable humility the success

we so crave can be attained

reconnecting us to a calm

that we have long forgotten

flowers still bloom,

hybrid or genetically modified

preachers and politicians still bray

as an intelligent young girl of 12

from Handsworth,

whose parents hail from Leeds,

visits the Science museum

dreaming to be a nuclear physicist....

© roi kwabena 2004-2-16