Poem of the Week: Gowri Koneswaran

Photo by: Les Talusan          Hold     we're taught to hold hands  when we cross the street or walk with our mothers in parking lots or navigate crowds with a friend and don't want to come out alone  hold hands with whomever is closest when the power goes out  when the sirens come near when the moving of men marches silences into the corner  hold hands when they come calling,  when they threaten,  "this is necessary to teach you a lesson" or "this is necessary  to protect you"  hold hands when we stand still, when we walk, when we run when they tell us to surrender  when they tell us to do anything  hold hands when we fall from the sky, with or without parachute when we leap from tall buildings, with or without the ability to fly  hold hands with the ones who don't look like us, talk like us, believe like us  hands like fragile boxes or bombs,  things that could break or explode  each finger a troop in the human army  each gesture a shield  -Gowri Koneswaran Used by permission. Gowri Koneswaran is a Sri Lankan Tamil American poet, singer and lawyer. Her advocacy has addressed animal welfare, the environment, and the rights of prisoners and the criminally accused. She was a Lannan Fellow of the Folger Shakespeare Library and a member of the 2010 DC Southern Fried Slam team, and has performed at Lincoln Center Out of Doors, the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage and the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. Gowri’s poetry has appeared in Beltway Poetry Quarterly, Bourgeon and Lantern Review. She leads poetry and communications workshops and hosts open mics at Busboys and Poets and BloomBars in Washington, DC, where she serves as poetry coordinator. She is also a poetry editor with Jaggery: A DesiLit Arts and Literature Journal. Gowri tweets on-the-spot haiku @gowricurry. Please feel free to forward Split This Rock Poem of the Week widely. We just ask you to include all of the information in this email, including this request. Thanks! If you are interested in reading past poems of the week, feel free to visit the blog archive.