February Marching

A memory now of
February thoughts
Cracked upon the sidewalk. We brought cameras to bring down governments

*CLICK*

“say cheese.” Gone in a flash,
One of the most evocative names in the language turning over on my tongue. New York. Keep turning it to try and make it real that I am here, in the great living myth as steam rises from the streets.
We’re on the greatest stage and the play is only just beginning. New York’s finest reduced to sleeping policemen muttering surprise “they just keep coming.”
Yeah, we’ll bring down the government with a flash and a bang of drums. Sing it loud, sing it loud.
“Whose streets? Our streets
“Whose streets? Our streets.”
This is history dusting itself off and exploding around me in full technicolour glory. An Englishman in New York and never more at home. We found our voice at the moment when silence seemed assured
as they promise bullets, we march with carnivals and colour and placards lifted from a dream of how the past once looked.

*CLICK*

Placards sway against the pale blue sky
Our No versus their Yes
and we scream it and we scream it against the news-flash, the hooves of mounted police, against our own governments. Two nations separated by a common language but their No is our No and our No is their No, that same No uttered all over the world
This is people united, trying to write another future.
The love of life hoping to quell the love of death
New York has a hold of me, making me smile with everything I see.
"This way," says my friend as the horses try to divide one block of protest from the next.

*CLICK*

We rush on, past Grand Central Station where an old woman tries to stop the war with a sticker to a horse's hind

*CLICK*

Nearing the public library the streets are becoming shifting prisons and the state steps forward with batons and blockades.
This is the front line for peace
But it's not Their streets, it's Our streets.
“Whose streets? Our streets.”
The chant rings out again, but violence has a swift reply as pepper-spray speaks to the dissension of a will that is power and pain.
And feet no longer walk but kick the sweet air of freedom all the way to the back of the police wagon.

*CLICK*

"Let's get out of here."
To a quieter street, where the police still protest our freedom in more peaceful ways and there are no uniforms, just people talking,
A man scrambles to the top of a newspaper stand, wrapped against winter and armed against war, lifts aloft another placard: 'War is Stupid.'
For the Gods to see, for the tv crews to see, for our cameras to see.

*CLICK*

Pulled forward by the sound of chants from Times Square
We pass another line of officers and a crowd of revellers, chalking the road with accounts of how the powerful look from below.
Take a photo, keep a record of it all
because this is how lives are won and lost

*CLICK*

Another band of dissenters sway into view above the helmets and placards, led by drums, whistles and singing. An effigy of the President dances above the crowd, catching my eye before it's pulled down
And then there is confusion.
Excitement and fear
“You’ve got to take the photo.” says an elderly New Yorker in a shell-suit. Who? A girl breaks away from the unified mass directing her camera at something hidden by a police van. Trying to snatch the truth before it’s snuffed out by size-10 boots.

*CLICK*

Police boots stamping on an effigy of the President pulled from the protest

*CLICK*

Uniformed hands try to censor our vision of how the world might appear
"Give me the camera."
Surly hands unravel the scene, stripping the girl of our mechanical ally in this war of truth. Unexposed ideas die in the sunlight as the film is cracked from the camera
And lays upon the frozen sidewalk, a small defeat
But we know that victory is coming. There are too many cameras. There are too many minds
There is no arrogance great enough to withstand such a popular protest
In Time's Square rolling neon answers our prayers: Bush and Blair shaken by protests. Announce they will reconsider the war.
I feel victorious.
I was right to believe in this world. I was right to believe that the love of life will triumph over the love of death.
But the fight for peace will not stop here and New York has a new cheer.
“Til sundown! Til Sundown!”
We are louder than You.
“Til Sundown! Til Sundown!”
We are greater than You.

*CLICK*

We brought cameras to bring down governments

*CLICK*