by LJ Frank

Tell her I am leaving now,

a cause long forgotten

slowly seeps back into my brain

as I step over a mangled, dead body

lying in the street 

another on a mountain side

a human soul bleeds

another religious holiday arrives

woven in a tapestry

of stone, wire and bullets

and a child dies of hunger

a veteran of some past war kills himself,

soldiers, police and vigilantes

exit the cathedrals and temples of faith

attending to the corporate business at hand,

the politics of blood

shed

but in whose Name?

 

I contemplate the imprisoning walls

built on the borders of the mind

when I notice a journalist who shares a photograph

he took the day before

of folded hands no longer attached to the owner’s arms

lying in the gutter in prayer

forsaken by their God,

and a young boy cries, “it hurts”

but reason and love are  in hiding

an illness in the human spirit prevails.

 

A rumbling echo is heard in a distant valley

I climb a rock-strewn slope

and look over my shoulder

pondering

who profits the most

as more weapons arrive

in a distant field

while deal makers make deals

the voices of war remain undiminished

and in the wilderness of hope

is an arid land

I must cross,

tell her I am leaving now.