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Sunday, April 24, 2022

SONG FOR MARIUPOL

 


A lament, a dirge, a cry from the human heart,
for the old folk of Mariupol, weeping in cellars,
without food or water, without hope,
old men and women, longing
for a hot cup of tea,
a warm blanket, somewhere to lie down.

They have been here before; they know
how this goes, as their loved ones disappear:
devastated towns, their dwellings in rubble,
mass graves, executed loved ones,
bombs falling indiscriminately,
with no care  for civilian life. "Shoot them all!"
the soldiers are commanded, and,
somehow, they turn off the switch
of humanity in their heads and
follow orders: tape hands behind backs,
shoot people in the head: uncles, grandfathers,
grandmothers. They rape the young women first.
Deemed  "casualties of war," these people
who never wanted war, but who do not wish
to live under a dictatorship.

(What happens when the soldiers return home
to their wives and children? Will their dreams
be haunted by ghosts of the dead,
arriving at two a.m.
to ask them "why?")

Mass graves and destroyed buildings
where once life thrived - the spoils of war,
perpetrated by those without soul or conscience,
to whom genocide will bring 
perceived glory: more land - full of rubble,
devoid of human life - a testimony
to moral decrepitude.

What song can we sing as bombs rain down,
on three month old babies?
As people starve, terrified dogs run loose
in the streets, or shiver violently in the rubble?
Are we beyond hope, as a species,
in this land of lost souls? How can we sing
a whole peoples' persecution, for no reason
beyond one man's depravity and thirst for power?
(as if any power or wealth can be gained
from a rubbled landscape
full of graves.)

I sang all my life, but in my old age,
after all I have seen, and lived, and lost,
I don't think my throat can muster
a single note of a song for Mariupol.
I offer  instead my poem and my tears,
for this song is just way too sorrowful
to sing.

A sad song for The Sunday Muse

9 comments:

  1. Sherry, it is a mournful song, good write!!! The russian president was shown on TV crossing himself for Easter. His Bible is like others? Those books have the ten commandments, the 5th is "Thou shall not kill." Besides being a ruthless killer and a mad man, he now has been shown to be a hypocrite.
    ..

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  2. This poem speaks for those who cannot and truly grips the heart. That last line is powerful and moving. A poignant and truly lovely poem Sherry!

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  3. The whole situation is unbearable. I agree with you that when is old, it feels just impossible to even read about, though I certainly try to, just to bear witness. Thank you for the poem and your feelings. K.

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  4. A poem is as good as a song. You have expressed true despair with your words.

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  5. Though I sing, still .. my voice wavers when my mind’s eye replays what see on the TV screen. When I think of the suffering, the senseless destruction. What have we become? Your poem is eloquent and sobering.

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  6. I wouldn't have had the strength to weave all of these words into such a picture, Sherry. It's a devastating situation.


    Sincerely,
    David

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  7. Such a powerful song of a poem Sherry.

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  8. A song of lament that looks at evil, and wonders how? why? Stunning, Sherry.

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