For tired organizers, activists and all you good people: the low road.

[EFerrari]

I listened to Dahr Jamail's reporting of the horrors in Iraq tonight. (He's on a book tour for Beyond the Green Zone.) He wraps up this way:

What can they do
to you? Whatever they want.
They can set you up, they can
bust you, they can break
your fingers, they can
burn your brain with electricity,
blur you with drugs till you
can't walk, can't remember, they can
take your child, wall up
your lover. They can do anything
you can't stop them
from doing. How can you stop
them? Alone, you can fight,
you can refuse, you can
take what revenge you can
but they roll over you.

But two people fighting
back to back can cut through
a mob, a snake-dancing file
can break a cordon, an army
can meet an army.

Two people can keep each other
sane, can give support, conviction,
love, massage, hope, sex.
Three people are a delegation,
a committee, a wedge. With four
you can play bridge and start
an organization. With six
you can rent a whole house,
eat pie for dinner with no
seconds, and hold a fund raising party.
A dozen make a demonstration.
A hundred fill a hall.
A thousand have solidarity and your own newsletter;
ten thousand, power and your own paper;
a hundred thousand, your own media;
ten million, your own country.

It goes on one at a time,
it starts when you care
to act, it starts when you do
it again and they said no,
it starts when you say We
and know you who you mean, and each
day you mean one more.

-- Marge Piercy

[Radical Activist]

1. Unity is power.

I hope the people bashing Obama for talking about unity think about this post.

[fenriswolf]

2. nice poem reminded me of a poem by

robert service, an alaskan gold miner poet

Grin

Grin
If you're up against a brusier and you're getting knocked about --
Grin.

If you're feeling pretty groggy, and you're licked beyond a doubt --
Grin.

Don't let him see you're funking, let him know with every clout,
Though your face is battered to a pup, your blooming heart is stout;
Just stand upon your pins until the beggar knocks you out --
And grin.

This life's a bally battle, and the same advice holds true
Of grin.

If you're up against it badly, then it's only one on you,
So grin.

If the future's black as thunder, don't let people see you're blue;
Just cultivate a cast-ron smile of joy the whole day through;
If they call you"Little Sunshine," wish that they'd no troubles too --
You may -- grin.

Rise up in the morning with the will that, smooth or rough,
You'll grin.

Sink to sleep at midnight, and although you're feeling tough,
Yet grin.

There's nothing gained by whining, and you're not that kind of stuff;
You're a fighter from way back, and you won't take a rebuff;
Your trouble is that you don't know when you have had enough --
Don't give in.

If Fate should down you, just get and take another cuff;
You bank on it that there is no philosophy like bluff,
And grin.

[CorpGovActivist]

3. K&R n/t

[EFerrari]

4. Kick