Month: May 2011

Last Laugh (for K.V.)

We called men like him cowards,

Because he refused to fight

And murder civilians.

Because he shot his officer in the back.

Because he came home and shot himself

Instead.

We call men like him cowards.

Because the rest of us could never understand:

The pain in his heart;

The sinking gut;

The explosions in his head.

We didn’t get the joke:

That cryptic clarity

That needed to be

put to rest.

We call them cowards

We call them

We call

We.

Cowards.

Sempiternal

May 1, 2011; Ground Zero …

The sweet scent of death.

Celebrate the end of fear

at public hangings!

Nursery Rhymes …

… Yet, what lessons learned?

Ten years of nightmares, and still

we hide behind flags.

Black Horizons …

Where did the sun go?

Black smoke rises from straw men

who preach in the flames.

Cold Mathematics:

Every time a child is bombed …

… terrorists are born.

Transfusion

My heart is the furnace,
That feeds on my blood,
My lungs are the bellows,
Stoking the flames,
The mere act of being,
Is all consuming,
With life and death hidden,
Throughout the veins.
Heart as furnace,
Lungs as bellows,
Pull the blood through,
And burn it away,
Transfusions are needed,
To prolong the process,
Yet finding the outcome,
Is always the same.
Heart of furnace,
Lungs of bellows,
The heat of living,
Is what we have gained,
We carry it with us,
In the guise of knowledge,
Yet fearfully speaking,
It’s smoldering name.