Intimate Terrorists

Rosemary Daniell

"Last week a military court in Peru sentenced (Lori) Berenson, 26, to
to life in prison for treason. . . . Police say she helped supply arms,
a safe house and intelligence information to the Marxist Tupac
Amaru revolutionary movement. . . ."
      -- Newsweek, January 22, 1996

". . .the universe seems decent because decent people have gelded eyes."
      -- George Bataille, Story of the Eye

"I can't sit back and watch TV
while people are starving," you said
to your dad  an American college
professor. "I told her to follow
her heart," he  grieving   says now
Yes  Lori  you were raised right--
one of those good liberal kids
born to a do-gooder strain full
of the desire to do the right thing....
And who among us could resist
that great bonus thrown in the lure
of the jungle  Indiana Jones
South of the Border & all that?
Once   it was Eva Marie Saint
sleeping with a young Paul Newman
fighting for Israel  even
if she was blonde  a shiksa. . . .
And probably some cute Marxist
his big baby browns  muscular
thighs appealed to everything:
your groin your desire to help
& help.... "There's not one terrorist
among them!" you screech from the photo
in Newsweek  an average-pretty
girl in blue jeans flanked by two
unsmiling guards  women in dark
glasses  high heels  double-breasted
suits  oozing the kind of cruel
glamor filling third world movies. . . .
Yet the state department   (the state
department?)   says you're deluded
that there is proof: of robberies
bombings  assassinations. And
here you are about to be thrown
into prison for life: Yanamayo. . . .
where inmates have their food
their daylight rationed. . . . Lori
have you  with your good girl's heart
been as conned as I have by those
I hold dear  the strung out  the insane
the clever ones who daily convince
me that they only live through my
blood sacrifice? Are their garbled
cries as much a plant as your hand-
writing   scribbled over diagrams
drawings of weapons  left to be found
in your Lima apartment? And
will my liberal heart and yours
continue to bleed & bleed   (not
to speak of your sweet parents')
while those who learned early to look
away  eyes blinkered to keep
noses clean  enjoy what you & I
were born to   but can't quite? Or
a half-century from now  shaped
to that rock  a woman long shriveled
will you look back  scoff at the love
the beliefs yes  the very kindnesses
that took away everything?