1966

I cry for the Vietnamese people.
Their doom is sealed, I'm afraid.

My country's so scared,
we will cut them to bits
and pound their land to a pulp.

We bomb them and burn them
and gas them.

                        (It's for Freedom)

We burn their huts to the ground.

                        (It's to save them)

If we weary
there is always the bomb.

We send our young men over to
Kill them,
Purged of unpure thoughts
holy
of one mind and purpose they go

                         (Propaganda, censorship,
                        indoctrination, briefing,
                        court-martial, dishonorable
                        discharge, Jail, disgrace)

to do their duty.

Do not share any differing opinions.

                        (Mud Mail)

Be cheerful and bland and encouraging.

                        (Send them candy)

To die for your county's the greatest.

                        (Send them soap)

Cheer them up.

But if you want to know why
we are fighting,

                        (some doubts have crept into your mind)

Just ask these young men.

                        (they'll tell you, about Peace-niks,
                        draft card burners, Communists, mud,
                        insects, no sleep, booby traps,
                        can't trust any native)

Then you will know.

I weep for the Vietnamese people.
With friends like us
they don't need
any
          enemies.

© Edison S. Fisk, 2009. All rights reserved.

Fisking the Establishment

Fisking the Establishment's

Like goosing a prudish prig.

Senses shocked, ghost crashes roof

Screaming God's vengence.

Fisking the Establishment

Frazzles nice citizen nerves.

Citizen needs police protection

Against pink man with big idea

That blasting and burning people

Is not a nice way

To win a lasting peace,

Or even a cease-fire.

Fisky Pink's ammunition

Is well-chosen words

And a caloused cheek

Ready to turn again

In the cause of peace.

C. Allen Burr

________________

Burr, C. Allen. "Introduction." In Pinky Fisk, An Anthology of Obscene Thoughts and Poetry. (c. 1969-1972)

(copr. Edison S. Fisk and C. Allen Burr, c. 1969-1972, 2009. All rights reserved.)

Day 1 of Year 94

Happy Birthday Pinky!

Pinky says he was born on "The Real Memorial Day," which used to fall on May 30 before the creation of the Three Day Weekend.

It is a fitting day for the birth of a man best known as standing for peace.

Omni Quid Bumbalari...

"All This Bumbling Must Mean Something"

- Pinky Fisk

As far as he knew, Pinky made up the word bumbalari based on two years of high school Latin. He studied hard because he was terrified of his teacher. She would point her finger at arms length, singling out the student selected to recite the Latin answer to her question. One didn't want to be caught unprepared.

However, a search for the term bumbalari brings up a few hits in Portuguese, including this Google translation:

If they do please let's take a big Hip Hip Hooray, to celebrate the arrival of spring! And to show my joy I leave you the lyrics of a song so beautiful that I learned in school music education, now here goes ...

    I like flowers, birds singing
    In the spring, always singing,
    Voices of a thousand songs sound the air ...
    Bumbalari, bumbalari, bumbalari, bumbalari

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=pt&u=http://cuskisses.blogspot.com/2009/03/ela-chegou.html&ei=qFTNSsbbMYOuswOKw9m2Dg&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=4&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dbumbalari%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7DKUS_en


© Edison S. Fisk, 2009. All rights reserved.

Obscene Thoughts and Poetry

This blog will feature works from An Anthology of Obscene Thoughts and Poetry by Edison "Pinky" Fisk. Pinky wrote most of these words during the turbulent war protest days of the 60s and 70s.

Those heady days were recalled by columnist Adele Ferguson:

   "Edison 'Pinky' Fisk was Bremerton's most famous anti-war activist in the 1960s and 1970s, once getting himself arrested for carrying a sign downtown that read 'The Grateful Society, Bombs, Bullets, Battleships and B--- ----."
(Adele Ferguson, "Pinky Fisk recalls King's old idea," Kitsap Sun, 1/18/1993)

A decade later, the home town paper recalled:

    "For sheer eccentricity, small protests outside the U.S. armed forces recruiting offices in downtown Bremerton during the 1960s and 1970s are fondly remembered now by those who took part.
   "The protests, started during the Vietnam War by a local character in his 50s named Edison 'Pinky' Fisk, usually only attracted four or five people at most.
   "But they were Kitsap County's first war protests, and Fisk was arrested three or four times -- once for disturbing the peace when he paraded around with a protest sign proclaiming, 'The Grateful Society: Bombs, Bullets, Battleships and Bull----.'
   "The sign was returned five years later when charges against him were dropped."
("Kitsap County no stranger to big rallies," Kitsap Sun, 3/2/2003)

(Apparently by 2003 it was considered safe to print "Bull----.")

What you have to understand is that Bremerton, home of the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, has always been a Navy town. To stand outside the Shipyard in those days with an anti-war sign took the kind of courage most of us will never muster.

Interestingly, Pinky says that he had better conversations about the war with many of the Shipyard workers than he did with his "liberal" friends.

This blog is going live today as a tribute to Pinky's 94th birthday, which we celebrated Saturday. He called Thursday to announce, "In two days I'll be an old man." Old in years, perhaps, but ageless at heart. His eyes and legs may not work so well these days, but his wit isn't in bad shape.

- K (the "k" in PinKy)