Lysistrata, Yesterday (411 B.C.) and Today (2003 A.D.)
by Peggy de Broux
The women of this world know
as do their lovers, husbands, friends:
love and peace safeguard sons, daughters,
neighbors, strangers,
everyone we know
and don't know.
Every speaker of English
and all other languages really knows
that force does not answer;
only peaceful resolutions
will keep this earth alive and well.
Olive branches go to peace-bringers,
not to gun-bearing, missile-firing
armies, navies, air force pilots.
Pray to that god you keep upholding,
and I'll pray to mine.
No more war in our lifetimes
nor the lifetimes of offspring.
In all these many centuries
since that Greek play
--women refusing love
to husbands at war until
they lay down their arms--
has this civilization learned nothing?
Be well, think well,
consider the earth
and its progeny: all the fishes
in the sea, all the life in the air,
those who walk the ground,
ride the waves or trek through snow.
Who can better create peace
than man- and womankind?
PEGGY
DE BROUX grew up in arid West Texas and is very happy for the
cool Northwest weather in Port Angeles, Washington. She tutors French and teaches a writing workshop weekly. As a poet, she has been
published in various journals since the mid-80s in the U.S., Canada and Great Britain. Her two chapbooks are Confluence and Other Poems,
published by Strait Publishing, Port Angeles, WA, 2002 and Brittle Leaves, published by Open Bone Publications, also Port Angeles, WA,
1998. Her poems appear in The Unitarian Universalist Poets anthology, Pudding House Publications, Johnstown, OH, 1996 and
Beyond Bad Times:
An Anthology of North American Poetry, Snowapple Press, Edmonton, Alberta, 1993. She is interested in all types of literature, art and
the environment. She enjoys puttering in the garden and gazing at the Strait of Juan de
Fuca. Her academic degrees are in Comparative Literature and French.
Peggy's
chapbooks can be ordered from:
Strait Publishing
240 West Third Street
Port Angeles, WA 98362
e-mail: peggydb@olympus.net
PEGGY
DE BROUX grew up in arid West Texas and is very happy for the
cool Northwest weather in Port Angeles, Washington. She tutors French and teaches a writing workshop weekly. As a poet, she has been
published in various journals since the mid-80s in the U.S., Canada and Great Britain. Her two chapbooks are Confluence and Other Poems,
published by Strait Publishing, Port Angeles, WA, 2002 and Brittle Leaves, published by Open Bone Publications, also Port Angeles, WA,
1998. Her poems appear in The Unitarian Universalist Poets anthology, Pudding House Publications, Johnstown, OH, 1996 and
Beyond Bad Times:
An Anthology of North American Poetry, Snowapple Press, Edmonton, Alberta, 1993. She is interested in all types of literature, art and
the environment. She enjoys puttering in the garden and gazing at the Strait of Juan de
Fuca. Her academic degrees are in Comparative Literature and French.