Jean-Martin Aussant, founder of the left-wing sovereigntist Option Nationale party...waking up Friday morning with his children in Edinburgh.
“Scotland is really beautiful, Papa!” they remarked.
He corrected them: “We are in the United Kingdom.”
-- “Quebec sovereigntists take lessons from failed Scottish referendum,” Toronto Star
listening to the words
Independence Referendum
that have aged
since my last trip home... half moon
over the Taiwan Strait
Living on Ilha Formosa, we are haunted by a war of names,
fighting for the Republic of China/Taiwan.
fighting for the Republic of China/Taiwan.
We Chinese, we Taiwanese, will never end our civil war --
a bloody bloodless civil bore.
a bloody bloodless civil bore.
No Kamikazes crashing, no Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. murdered.
To Uncle Sam and Brother Momotaro, we are the good soldiers.
Lacking the ghosts of history, we are haunted by names.
Note: In 1544, a Portuguese ship sighted the main island of Taiwan and named it "Ilha Formosa," which means “Beautiful Island.”
Listen to the "Democracy Now! Debate: Should Scotland Vote for Independence? Musician Billy Bragg vs. Historian Sam Wetherell," http://www.democracynow.org/2014/9/17/debate_should_scotland_vote_for_independence
ReplyDeleteRead: "Exit Stage Right: The Case Against Scottish Independence." By Sam Wetherell (Jacobin),
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/09/exit-stage-right-the-case-against-scottish-independence/
Read: "Scottish Nationalism and British Nationalism Aren’t the Same." By Billy Bragg (Guardian), http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/16/scottish-nationalism-british-westminster-class