PostPoems Be Artistic. Be Creative. Be Inspired!

we stood by and did nothing
as the mortars fell
upon the entire city
destroying all who dare to step in front
of their altering path
and even those who didn't
from them too
their precious lives they took
and almost happily so
still

we stood by and did nothing
as innocent, hungry women and children
were heinously murdered in cold blood
by unknown attackers
who sat on the hillsides far, far away
with their snipers' machine guns ready in
hand
yet

we stood by and did nothing
even as the cameras continued rolling
when the open marketplace became an embattled
war zone and so much blood was splattered upon
the sidewalks that the wounded lay strung about
like human litter
lifelessly bloody and immobile
with their near death like faces pressed
soundly to the cold uncaring concrete
like they were low paid extras in some slash
budget horror film
many of us here were and were not moved by
such spectacular gore
for the majority of the American people have
seen such abomination of frail humanity
some ten times over before
even we of the younger generation
sadly enough

Repeatedly A&E shows the distorted and vulgar
inhumane treatment that the Jews were
brutally subjected to that anti-Christ Hitler's
filthy death camps
they play over and over on our television screens
late at night in dismal yet scratchy black and
white old news reels
so, such Baltic news today has the same hold on
the horror loving viewer
and seems to play itself out a lot like a World War II
movie
it just doesn't completely register though to
everyone as being all too real
'More Mortar fire fell heavily today on the country of
Bosnia today'
the CNN anchor woman read with no apparent reaction
of any sort in her business-like-voice
'leaving sixty seven dead and one hundred and four
wounded'
to some it sounds almost
Uninteresting
merely by the way it is being reported
lifeless
with no emotions nor a fraction of feeling
like such occurrence is almost now
commonplace
yet sadly enough

It is
it's just yet another batch of random numbers
read off to us like points upon the stock market
what do such slated figures really mean
and who after all is really paying all that much
lose attention to them
maybe Phil, but not Geraldo I bet
for such stories to him are not large enough
audience grabbers
like say, 'blind transvestites on steroids'
but I care
and remain aware of those poor peoples plight
and if I, myself were an invincible army of one
I would go over there and personally give those
spineless atheist Serbs just what they themselves
deserve
all the rape , torture and mayhem that they have
inflicted for the past two years
given right back to them
make them switch places with the Croates
have them fearing for their very lives
with no hopeful tomorrow in sight
make them live in bombed out cities
murder and dismember their people for no
real reason
leave them baffled to wonder why
people such as they, (if you can actually call
them people like those murderous militia men of
the Third Reich)
ethnic cleansers
(they are now called today)
should be forced to pay for such crimes
against each our fellow man

I ask you
must SIX MILLION MORE DIE needlessly
like in the camps
before we put all our heads together
(some quite brilliant too) and think of a way
to stop this slaughter

Did Schindler's List not touch you in some way?
and just what do we say ( if we cannot come up
with a solution) to the remaining families
of those poor people murdered on camera and shown
world wide to us on our television sets each
evening on the news

'I'm Sorry'
somehow that just doesn't seem
good enough now does it?
well, I mean , tell me
would it to you?

I somehow think not!
(June 16,1994)