The View From the Floor
A poem from a campus die-in to cancel study away programs in Israel
by Charlie Gee, a poet and peace-building organizer in the Twin Cities
On March 5th, 2024, a group of Macalester students participated in a die-in in Macalester’s Kofi Annan Institute for Global Citizenship, which houses the school’s Center of Study Away. This action turned into a sit-in that lasted 48 hours.
The students protested to encourage the school’s administration to cancel partnerships for study away to universities in Israel (University of Haifa and Hebrew University) in response to the country’s relentless bombings of Gaza, removing these universities from the school’s pre-approved list of programs.
The idea behind cancelling these specific study away programs is that these universities have close ties with war, hosting weapons development programs and sponsoring surveillance programs used against Palestinian civilians with no ties to any violence. In addition, these universities have documented accounts of limiting free speech and discriminating against Palestinian students. You can learn more on the official proposal to the Macalester administration, linked here.
As one of these students, I joined this protest because I believe that universities should not contribute to the bombing and targeting of civilians, and that students do not need to study in Israel to see that discrimination towards and murder of Palestinians exist.
The View From the Floor
By Charlie Gee
The night was thick with a quiet uneasiness, quelled with murmured voices, friendly faces as the day dipped into dusk. I sat on the cold concrete, painting my feelings into cardboard. I walked back home for dinner with a friend and we talked about our futures together. The next morning is a funeral, dressed in black. We ‘die’ on the floor of the Kofi Annan Institute for Global Citizenship. Then, a silence that is full with the weight of death in this world, the gentle shuffling of office workers tip-toeing around our bodies. No one looks into our eyes. The day passes in vignettes. We shout our hearts out. We nap, we type furiously on our midterm essays. We press ink into USPS labels that now read “Free Palestine.” We sing Tracy Chapman’s “Talkin’ Bout a Revolution.” A man who has since acted kindly steps into our sanctuary; the room holds its breath. Here, life goes in slow motion for me. I hear him say the words I do not want to hear. The room erupts into screams, noise so tangible I can feel it in my body. I am silent, with my back against the wall. I burst into a flood of tears that will not stop; my vision blurs. I do not know what is happening. All I know is that, despite the noise we made, we were not heard.
Editors’ Note: We believe that poetry—writing and reading and distributing it—has a part to play in the liberation of Palestine and all people from cycles of militarism, colonization, and violence. If you’d like to publish your anti-war poetry (or other art forms) with us, email us at tenkbombseditorial@proton.me.