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Take My Paw Rescue
Take My Paw Rescue
I didn't want to write this poem
about bombs falling, people fleeing
in terror, covered with blood.
I wanted to write about
the five purple tulips abloom
on my table, about patting the wolf-dog,
and the way he so gleefully took
the special treat from my hand
and pranced away.
I didn't want to write about
the world's sorrow and outrage
as we watch a small country
being bombed into oblivion,
while the power-mad man
holds a rally to convince his followers
of his might, to tell them that
they had better believe.
I wanted to write as I once did,
about the promise of early morning
breaking across my springtime sky,
about gratitude, about hope,
about peace.
But I turned on the news, and
I won't look away. I will write
for all of them: all of the people
helping the wounded out of the rubble,
the doctors and nurses trying to save lives
while bombs are falling on their heads,
for the ones trying to get food and water
to the starving, the ones rescuing desperate
animals with terrified eyes, for the pregnant
women covered in blood, carried out
of the bombed maternity shelter where
they were trying to give birth.
I will write for
I will write for
the shell-shocked, the suddenly homeless,
the traumatized, the terrified, the helpless,
the dead bodies lying on the side of the road,
the gutted buildings,
the gutted buildings,
the displaced leaving their homeland
not knowing where they will go.
I will not look away.
I didn't want to write this poem.
But I turned on the news, and so
there was nothing else left
to say.
to say.
Inspired by War by Samantha Reynolds. The italicized lines are hers. Sharing at earthweal's open link.
i understand
ReplyDeleteLike you I cannot look away. The war in the Ukraine is terrible. I can hardly believe it is happening. I pray for peace. Suzanne - Mapping Uncertainty
ReplyDeleteWe definitely can't look away. But it is really hard to look. I think what we have to do is look and then go on with life knowing what we know. Sad, but true...there is so little WE can do.
ReplyDeleteThank you for this. You have written what I cannot as yet write. I have lost a friend to Putins War.
ReplyDeleteKim, that is terrible. It is mass slaughter, not standard combat war, soldier to soldier. It is hard that the rest of the world is standing back watching when he is so clearly in the wrong.
ReplyDeleteA powerful poem Sherry! It's hard to write about anything else...JIM
ReplyDeleteAny poet with empathy for the world must suffer heartbreak right now as distant hammers fall. A time for all things, to love, to sing, to walk, to stand up.
ReplyDeleteWar is full of horrors... but if we do look away, we might also see other wars, not shown on TV....like in Yemen. How many poems to write :(
ReplyDelete