Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Open Letter: Keystone XL ("Failure" a poem by annienomad-cyberpoet)


Open Letter to President Obama, Secretary of State Kerry, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird and Congress…


...especially...



Max Baucus (D-Mont.)
John Hoeven (R-N.D.)
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)
Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska)
John Barrasso (R-Wyo.)
Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.)
John Boozman (R-Ark.)
Kay Hagan (D- N.C.)
John Cornyn (R-Texas)
Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.)
Orrin Hatch (R-Utah)
Mary Landrieu (D-La.)
Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska)
Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.)
Rob Portman (R-Ohio)
Mark Pryor (D-Ark.)
Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.)
Jon Tester (D-Mont.)
David Vitter (R-La.)
Mark Warner (D-Va.)


"Failure"
by Sharee Anne Gorman
(annienomad-cyberpoet)

To defy authority
and the measure of its success. 

To embrace uniqueness
in a moment of clarity. 

To inhabit a land
without depleting its resources. 

To love a mate
and not take your fill on the side. 

To run for office
only to choose the People over Power. 

To understand,
that the only way to “win”
is to simply not play the game. 

2/26/2013 



©2013shareeannegorman
annienomad-cyberpoet



It appears more and more that in the halls of Congress, "success" is measured by what those in positions of power seek to exploit...but I reject that measure of success.

Tar Sands oil, and the mechanisms of its extraction, are toxic. Period. 

Whatever your rationales are: whether it is commerce and profit, energy supremacy and/or some death chess game with China…you have lost your way. Your strategies are NOT worth poisoning your people and the land that you and I are charged with protecting. 

EVOLUTION means MOVING FORWARD when we have DEVELOPED THE TECHNOLOGY to do so...for the BENEFIT of (and to PROTECT the FATE of) mankind.  

Fossil fuels are dead. And so too are our children if we do not acknowledge that wind, sun and steam are alive, renewable, easily harnessed and non-toxic. 

Stop digging in the ground and embrace the sky. Elevate us out of the hole you have dug us into. 

If this deal goes through I’m afraid we, the people, must insist that you change your job description from Civil Servants to Civil Sell-Outs. 

But don’t listen to me. 

I’m just...a failure.


At least, that's the way it seems to me...
annienomad-cyberpoet 

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Eye On The Sparrow - The Global Suggestion Box

Why I Created "Eye On the Sparrow - The Global Suggestion Box"


My name is Sharee Anne Gorman (annienomad-cyberpoet) and I created "Eye on the Sparrow - The Global Suggestion Box" to establish a place where citizens around the globe could offer a suggestion for Social Change and voice their concerns about the direction in which our world is headed.

The idea for "Eye On The Sparrow" occurred to me after a petition I authored to implement a Global Labor Treaty for Living Wages wasn't receiving the signatures it needed to get folks excited about starting a movement that assures a foundation upon which to grow just and stable societies - humane labor practices.

I have to admit, it pissed me off:) Then it wore me down, and it nearly broke my heart. But a thought emerged from all that disappointment and frustration. Admittedly, a pretty simple one. It was the realization that what we really need most right now is to get everybody on the same page.


I know...duh. The world is run and manipulated by advertising and PR execs who are trying every trick under the sun to accomplish that very thing.

So, yes, I am aware of my own hubris. Obviously, no one person or organization can save the world. We can't be everywhere at once, or know all things. But I recently remembered something from my youth and it seemed to be the very thing that is needed..."God's Eye is on the Sparrow".

Of course, there are many interpretations of "God". And many arguments that he doesn't exist. There are even some downright angry individuals who have a few choice words for Him/Her about the nature of our existence (which they fully plan to air if they ever get the opportunity). But it occurs to me that if GOD, or at the very least Conscious Thought, is in all of us then isn't "God's Eye on the Sparrow" every time we turn our attention and best intentions toward solving the problems that injure, harm and enslave us?

There are many ideological roadblocks to everyone being on the same page, especially when it comes to religion and political affiliations. There are overwhelming work schedules, or personal and financial strife eating up our energy and sapping our hope...not to mention all the countless digital distractions our modern world has to offer. But, in this age of technology, we really don't have an excuse anymore for not moving forward on our most pressing issues, not when an idea can travel around the planet in the blink of an eye.

The problem is not - that humans have all the right information but just can't seem to reach a consensus. The problem is - that it's almost impossible to get good information through the lock-down of a rigged game. A game that has sent the whole world hurtling toward what some might call "critical mass".

I created "Eye on the Sparrow - The Global Suggestion Box" because I don't believe I'm the only one who feels that if decisive steps aren't taken soon we will look up from our digital distractions to find we have passed the point of no return.

I believe what we desperately need is a return to simple compassion and a letting go of willful blindness. We need to find our common ground and not just ask for, but seriously set about creating, the solutions that could mark a change in our perception and free us from our dated, cultural and societal assumptions.

Perhaps "God's Eye is on the Sparrow" when we "keep our eye on the ball" by protecting this amazing planet. "The Global Suggestion Box" is a place where we do not have to be separated by different departments, specialized degrees, social-strata, divisive political parties or warring religious factions. It's just a place of Good Will where we can get the conversation rolling.

When we accept our differences and work together to steer ourselves away from greed, aggression, domination and ego....it's not just a win/win. It's a win/win/win/win. For you. For me. For the present. And for the future.

If Conscious Choice is what sets us apart from the automatic world, then let us work together to pull back from the brink of our destruction.


Please check it out if you get a free moment:) I invite you to leave a suggestion of your own, or just show support for an idea you feel would make a difference. 

Eye On the Sparrow - Global Suggestion Box
 
It was just launched, so the box is pretty empty right now - but I figure that just gives it more space to grow!
 
At least, that's the way it seems to me,
Sharee Anne Gorman
annienomad-cyberpoet

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Angry, Gun-Wielding Chickens


If we Americans want to stop the violence here at home, we have to stop committing violence abroad.

Citizens, young and old, are losing their minds because they cannot reconcile the pervasive disconnect between our national PR image as philanthropic liberators, and our conquistador, foreign policy actions overseas.

America’s military actions are made possible only by disguising our expansionism with the proper amount of plausible deniability -  "we create *security* by going and destroying the people that attack us"...even though they only attack us because we are expanding our military presence in their land.

Many religious people and good citizens of every stripe have been fooled into thinking we are noble. That our actions in the world are to protect ourselves and others from tyranny. But we are the tyranny. Not America. No. What America has *become*…an invading force and strong-arm tool for resource grab to financially benefit the richest of the rich.

Belief in a greater good, doing the right thing and protecting the weak has been co-opted by those who live according to whichever strategy will maintain dominance and inequality. Even if people have to die, or whole nations must be stripped of their natural resources, in order to accomplish those ends.

Geopolitical strategists think that this is the way of nature. It’s a game to them. A life or death game, that they plan to win. But it’s more than “survival of the fittest”. They want to live in extreme wealth and luxury and wield great power over others.

They don’t understand co-operation. They don’t understand sharing. They only understand taking, so they can have more than anyone else. But they can’t just take what they want and re-write history to make themselves look good, like they used to.

We live in a world of real-time media now. Now these agendas must be buried under a great deal of misinformation and misdirection through distraction so that citizens around the globe don’t rise up in protest.

Which is why citizens are now being raised to be sociopathic, gamer/consumers - brain-washed into shooting everything in sight and conned into buying every new version of electronic toy or computing equipment that the American advertising industry can throw at them.

All of which leads to depression and addiction - whether it be drugs, alcohol, sex or whatever…they all have become part of the distraction cycle.

Kids are raised to have over-simulated “want buttons”, thanks to the avarice encouraged in them from the time they are old enough to watch a television commercial.

Now young people grow up to find they are stuck in a losing paradigm. They are under-employed and turned into indentured slaves by under-payment for their labor. Or, hobbled by soaring tuitions, if they opt for higher education - not for the purpose of gaining greater knowledge, mind you, just for the purpose of snagging a bigger paycheck. The purpose of such hobbling being that you can never, never question authority or you will lose the “opportunity” to earn your way out of that kind of debt.

Through this strategy the planners have created a controlled society through economic pressure, unless, god-forbid, people break free of the mind-control.

Which is why citizens are being kept in a zombie-like state of existence, tied to their computers, phones and x-boxes.

Young people have come to feel the only other way out of poverty is to become famous. Figuring they’ll play the long shot and avoid the gravity of poverty, but that requires a level of hustlerism that becomes its own prison. It requires having a marketable talent like athleticism, singing, acting or directing.

But, of course, gamers, consumers and online surfers are impulse junkies so they have to opt for the get-famous-quick plan of humiliating themselves for the sake of a numb and cruel tv audience because by this time they can’t plan a life…they can only react to adrenaline.

It is almost inevitable that, eventually, the meaninglessness of it all overtakes them and they lose it.

Either they breakdown, quietly and inwardly. Or they snap. Loudly and outwardly. At which point, in extreme cases, they end up shooting up their school mates or a shopping mall or movie theater...because they feel it is the only way to break out of their prison and make a name for themselves – even if it’s a bad name.

Leaders are trying to blame it all on guns. I don’t like guns, but I understand why people feel they need them. And the hoarding of them is an expression of fear. A fear born out of distrust, because citizens can sense that something is wrong.

I believe, if we create a world that is truly just and truly of good will, guns will become obsolete. It is my belief that they will be forgotten and left rusting in the fields, or on display in museums, as the relics of the past they will have become by the time we evolve to the point of not needing them.

A fool’s dream? Yeah, maybe.

It still feels possible to me, even though things have gotten so dark. In fact, maybe *because* things have gotten so dark. It kind of feels like a tipping point for bullshit, doesn’t it? Like maybe people have all had enough and want to wake up from the lie they’ve been handed.

At one time, people were drawn into a world of fiction that was inspiring and ennobling. And if they had trouble in the *real* world because their head was full of grand adventures and heroes’ journeys - well, they became dreamers. They used their apartness for contemplation and aspirations for creating a better world through art and creative insights.

An endeavor I like to call, “Growing the Human” - consciously creating a condition in which we begin to understand through intelligence, compassion, self-awareness and productive challenge of authority our connection to our environment, our fellow citizens around the world and the interconnectivity of rich and poor so that we may become fully-functioning, fully-realized human beings. Because, that is the point at which we begin to see the world in a way that we did not, nor could not, understand before.

I think we are losing dreamers because the world promotes competition above all else, at the expense of the heart.

The rich know enough to "give back" through charities - but charities only offer temporary help and make the rich feel better about having taken so much in the first place. And worse they end up masking the larger problem. The larger problem being that those who live at the top of the pyramid have planned our society around misinformation and distraction to hide the fact that they are parasitically draining all resource from everyone beneath them.

We wouldn’t need charities for anything except natural disasters (which we naturally come together for anyway), if runaway greed were not creating runaway poverty.

The extremely rich are starting to feel the chink in their armor giving way. Their system is collapsing and now it seems the chickens are coming home to roost. Angry, gun-wielding chickens.

 
At least that’s the way it seems to me,

Annie

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

"Vigil" A Poem of American Crisis by annienomad-cyberpoet


"Vigil" 
A Poem of American Crisis
by
Sharee Anne Gorman
(annienomad-cyberpoet)


 rows of cameras roll
in silent running
 
recording for posterity
the scattered points of light
clustering steadily into pools
of brightly-lit umbrellas

unintended Chinese lanterns
gathered in grief

feeling very much the intruders
news crews bear witness to
a community in shock

humbled and shaken
they shiver at the sight of
orphaned parents protecting
the fragile flames of their
dwindling, yet somehow eternal,
remembrance candles

sodden handkerchiefs
are folded and refolded
by owners searching desperately
for an unused corner to dry
chapped and moistened cheeks

sleeves serve almost as well
for the less prepared

while those who stand
stone-faced and stubborn
leave tears to find
their own course

numbly offering up body salts
to the soggy ground beneath
unsteady feet

we’ve stopped asking “why”
"why" has lost all meaning

but the words “enough”
and “no more”
are quickly gaining
ground

we don’t care anymore
if it’s the guns,
the video games,
the horror movies
...or the meds...

those are just the symptoms of
an over-sold
and misspent culture

...we just want it to stop...

to understand the
reflection in this mirror
of our collective conscience

...the mirror to our madness...

a reflection that has become
...a vigil...
in its own right

12/17/12 

©2012shareeannegorman
http://annienomad.com

Monday, December 3, 2012

Non-Exclusive...A Poem by annienomad-cyberpoet

I was musing this morning about love and dating in today's world. Of a fragmented, lonely generation of people reluctant to commit, for fear of missing out on some new thrill or the latest trend of pleasure-seeking.

I suppose people are staying single longer so that, hopefully, they won't have a reason to cheat when, and if, they "settle down". But does it change a person to not create an environment of intimacy for so many years? Does casually sleeping around create a form of relationship ADD? Will bed-hoppers cheat anyway, simply because they have developed a taste for variety?

Or, does the lack of deep intimacy make one more reverent of love, making commitment a matter of default - a preference for their loved one, rather than a promise they are expected to keep and never break.

Lyrics from various songs come to mind like, "freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose".

Or, "I used to say no promises, let's keep it simple...but freedom only helps you say goodbye". These lyrics suggest a longing for something lasting and personal, something life changing and transformative - but what do I know, I'm just a poet sitting at her breakfast table.

In any case, this little poem is what surfaced as a result of my musings...for better or worse:)

Non-Exclusive

He doled his love out
like wafers of
salvation
 
Every night
was Sunday morning
 
A seeming
endless line of
eager, though
un-penitent
tongues
 
And she,
not to be out done,
did the same
 
Only,
in reverse
 
12/3/12
 
©2012shareeannegorman
 
  
Perhaps there is a wisdom in this life choice. Or, perhaps something is lost forever. I don't have the answer. I just thought it was important to ask the question.
 
At least, that's the way is seems to me,
 
Annie