Just : A Poem for Victims of War.
Just
(A Poem for Victims of War)
No mother, no father, no hope for the future,
From a surgical strike at the hands of a butcher,
With empty regrets of collateral damage,
The marketing speak disguises the carnage,
It covers our eyes from blood on the stone,
And slivers of meat freshly shred from the bone,
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But all human anguish, all abattoir scenes,
Are not to be broadcast on sanitised screens,
Joysticks and levers and push-button raids,
Play the game out in deadly arcades,
Guided by laser on computerised flights,
Cruising discreetly with enhanced megabytes.
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But under the radar of electro-veneer,
Lie ashes and trauma with children in fear,
Behind that image so incisive and clean,
All war is dirty, crazed and obscene.
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Home is the hero, hidden from view,
In a box softly covered in red, white and blue,
Dreams of the glories with military roll,
Lie scattered in fragments by remote control,
Too many to mourn, as they die in the sun,
The victims forgotten and buried too young.
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But not for peak-ratings, in this digital age,
The desolate runway and silent cortege,
We must not be witness to slaughter and waste,
All in the name of public good taste,
As our God is willing to send them afar,
Where men praise their killing in the name of Allah.
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Just is the reason, just is the cause,
Just as it is, just as it was,
Just are the ends that justify means,
War is just evil, crazed and obscene.
