The Deeds

The Virginia Quarterly Review ^ | Summer 2008 | Tom Sleigh

[forkinsocket]

“When we drove into Qana last year,” Joseph told me, scanning the gray concrete houses on either side of the road, “we heard flames roaring, the sound of the jets, people screaming, and the ringing of cell phones.” He looked at me and shrugged. “The relatives of people were calling to see if they were okay.” Joseph worked for the Red Cross during the 2006 war with Israel and was one of the first to enter the village after an Israeli bombardment massacred twenty-eight Lebanese civilians. Soft-spoken, slight, he was solicitous on the surface but, like many Lebanese, reserved, even wary. When I hired him as my driver and interpreter to take me south from Beirut, I knew only that he drove a taxi with his father and worked as a draftsman in an engineering firm to pay his way at Lebanese University. But then he offered to take me to Qana. He could show it to me, he said; he could tell me what he’d seen.

To get to Qana, we needed military clearance, and so we’d stopped at the central army compound in Sidon, one of the major cities in southern Lebanon. The Lebanese intelligence officer who handled foreign press was dressed in blue jeans and a checked oxford, his shirttail hanging out. His wire-rimmed glasses gave him a bemused air, and his thoroughly unmilitary bearing unsettled me. I knew that he knew that I knew he had all the power, and while he seemed to enjoy this, he also seemed to appreciate the absurdity of his own position. Why should he be the one to control who went to the south of Lebanon?

[forkinsocket]

.

[econjack]

...after an Israeli bombardment massacred twenty-eight Lebanese civilians.

When I see words like "massacred" in a story, you don't have to tell me later in the story that you're an unseasoned reporter. You've already tipped your hand to that fact.

[Grizzled Bear]

...after an Israeli bombardment massacred twenty-eight Lebanese civilians.

If you don't start nothin'

There won't be nothin'

[Cicero]

Never heard of this guy. He’s a poet at CUNY. A lousy poet, if this poem published by “Slate” is typical of his work.

“The Hole”
By Tom Sleigh
Updated Tuesday, March 21, 2006, at 6:57 AM ET

Out in the garden, the wind was like a dog
Digging in the snow, digging with its nails
To make a bed to lie down in against the freezing air:

And in my exhaustion, my stupefied numb thought
Dug and dug its way down to where I knew
You were—though how could I believe it?

Once, your irony and honesty refused
To let you say, “Oh yes, my son the genius!”
When I showed you a poem—saying with Groucho deadpan,

As you handed me back the paper, the typed words
Already a little smudged: “Hopkins is a good poet.”
And then you recited, “Margaret are you grieving

Over goldengrove unleaving? ... “ winking
At the poets not yet born ... poets who would
Come after me, poets who would not believe

There was any such woman as you,
Who would say of them and their poetry,
Shrugging a little, smiling your sly, lopsided grin:

“How old are you, hon? From what I’ve read,
Your sex life must be very important to you.”
Digging in the snow, digging with its nails

Down deep in the snow, the wind kept trying
To hollow a hole deep enough to escape its own bitter
Blowing of snow around the frozen garden.