Monday 4 August 2014

Candle

A night
For lighting candles
Commemoration
Of when nations
Went to war -
Yet still we ask
What for?

All these smug smiles
Parades
Saluting heroes
Just charades
For a mere five thousand
Kilometres from here -
They are dying once again.

But our leaders sing
The same refrain
Of brave soldiers
Of duty
Saving us
With their sacrifices -
Which they did.

But all the battles, wars
We've fought
Have only taught us
How better to kill.
And how to make money
From guns that never stay still.
Trading arms that sever limbs -
Then we sing hymns.

But here
Is an idea

Why not say "cease"?
Talk together, make your peace
Make the stupidity of wars
A noble cause
If it brings about an end.
Give their deaths a meaning
Not an excuse to send
Pathos and syrup.

This could be a chance
To end this dance of death.
To prove what we have learned
About the pointlessness.
To turn and say enough.
To truly commemorate
And make this a date
To remember.


1 comment:

  1. your poem meant a lot to me, thank you, it is so very true.

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