Choke: Witness for Peace

34"x4"x4", wooden baseball bat, eye of vertebrata  

(fish, amphibian, reptile, bird and mammal), 1998.

 

Courting Silence                          

Justice, being blind                                

but not deaf,

Finds unacceptable                                           

Sounds of suffering, laughter, breath

..........................................................

.....................................or......Choke

...............................................Don't blink

...............................................Don't strike

...............................................Don't breathe,                  

...............................................Justice is terribly swift.

 

The enforcement of international justice strikes out while the physical intimidation of opposition voices drives home. (A recent reaffirmation: A June 17, 1999 National Public Radio report on British paratroopers mentioned that they found in a torture chamber in Pristina, Kosovo, a baseball bat inscribed with the label "mouth-shutter".)