Woke Peace Poetry from Year of The Poet (Vol 74)

Featured in The Year of the Poet February, 2020 Volume 74.

Poetry in response to Belgian born Henri La Fontaine, 1913 Nobel Peace Prize winner.

Henri La Fontaine, 1913 Nobel Peace Prize winner. Peace poetry with Kimberly Burnham

Woke Peace

Lover of peace
part agitator part senator for the people
Henri La Fontaine 1913 Nobel Peace prize winner
saw his beloved Belgium invade in 1914
again in World War II
but not the return of peace
and liberation for he died in 1943

Between the wars
La Fontaine wrote
the people are not awake
dangers render a world organization impossible
secret bargaining behind closed doors
peoples will be as before
sheep sent to the slaughterhouses
or to the meadows
as it pleases the shepherds
international institutions ought to be
by the peoples and for the peoples

And I wonder what have we learned
in La Fontaine’s future
wars of our now past
about how to create
a world at peace

Belgium’s Peace Movement

I never knew when I was twelve
after World War I and II
the Korean war over
as fire fights raged in Vietnam
that I lived in a country
where Henri La Fontaine
a socialist tried to bring the world
to peace
he died long before I was born
but I walked where he walked
not yet woke to ways of bringing peace
to the world around me
today I write poetry as he once did
and work towards greater harmony
for my heart and for all
perhaps fifty years ago
as I walked in Brussels’ Grand Place
I absorbed some of his energy
a spirit of unity
compelled to carry on his legacy
walk and woke the world towards peace

Belgian Paix Vrede Peace

When we speak with one heart
one world speaks of peace

Peace takes just two letters
“Pa” in the Morvandiau language of France and Belgium

Three letters of “Poi” means peace
in Bourguignon

In Belgium the French say “Paix”
for the “Peace” we all desire

Also “Paix” in Bruxellois
a dialect spoken in the city of Brussels

“Påye” is peace in Németalföldi
a Flemish dialect

Also “Påye” in Walloon or Walon known also as Valão,
Valón, Betchfessîs, Liégeois, Namurois, Wallo-Picard and Wallo-Lorrain

Taking five letters, the Flemish say “Vrede”
in this language like Dutch

Limburgish peace is “Vreij” in yet another language
of many in this small bilingual country

The Year of the Poet Henri La Fontaine, 1913 Nobel Peace Prize winner. poetry with Kimberly Burnham

Originally published in The Year of The Poet (Vol 74) at http://www.innerchildpress.com/the-year-of-the-poet.php on February 1, 2020.