This
is the last reflection for my portfolio and I hope to use this opportunity to
put into perspective my other reflections. My first reflection was about sanity
as the ultimate casualty of war. My second reflection considered the choice
between the reality of death and the illusion of glory. My third reflection was
about the force of history. My fourth reflection argued that, without a
deliberate choice of action, history could easily become a process of
devolution. As an abstract principle, the choice is obvious, peace or war, life
or death. In the context of the world we live in, it is not so simple.
I
read Reyna Hernandez’s “Yankees” while riding a Bloor-Danforth train.
The line “they come “immunized” against everything except for death” echoed
within the fast-moving space plastered with posters promoting the flu shot.
This is the involuntarily human response: defend ourselves. In the long run,
the abundance of vaccines will induce new strains of viruses. Indeed, our
complex modern lifestyle had contributed to the current profusion of diseases.
However, to remove this artificial shield would cause deaths we can prevent of
lives we can protect.
This
draws upon the same sentiments as the claims of ‘Homeland Defense’ described by
David Watson in “Poetry, Empire and Catastrophe”. Terrorism is a
consequence of the structural violence that we have implemented and our attempt
to defend ourselves against terrorism causes further violence. In “Thoughts
in the Presence of Fear”, Wendell Berry suggests local self-sufficiency as
a means to end the structural violence caused by ‘free trade’. However, given
the current distribution of population and state of environment, this solution
will cause more starvation. In the short run, the right choice is perhaps more
painful.
Many
people regard September 11 as a wake up call, but we woke up to do what? Build
thicker walls? We have been doing that for eons. In this sense, the fall of the
towers did not change our world forever; it did not change our world at all.
The selection of works from “September 11, 2001 American Writers Respond” calls
for art as the voice of change, calls for artists to tell stories and paint
pictures and bring about the real awakening.
“What
follows, whether it comes to an end in one way, or the other, will depend in
some obscure way on all of us,” writes Watson. The individual is not a puppet
played by the government and the corporation. If the individual can look beyond
the next tax cut, beyond tomorrow’s stock market, beyond the temporary shelter
from violence he perpetuated, the government and the corporation will do the
same. We are unwilling to make sacrifices for eternal world peace because nobody
believes in it anyways. But why does peace have to be eternal or to encompass
the whole wide world to be worth something?
Sharon
Doubiago in “Jesus Was a Terrorist” refers to September 11 as “the
opportunity to forgive them”. If we had refrained from revenge, each person
that has died as a result of the attack would have been living proof of peace.
To adapt the words of Wislawa Szymborska:
Whoever claims that war's
omnipotent
is himself living proof
that it's not.
There's no peace
that couldn't be eternal
if only for a moment.
(416 words without first
paragraph and last quote)
Whoever claims that it's omnipotent
is himself living proof
that it's not.
There's no life
that couldn't be immortal
if only for a moment.