Children

forget the school children
of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

1,000,000 dead in Vietnam
60,000 dead in Iraq
30,000 and rising in Afghanistan

how many by our proxies
in El Salvador, Nicaragua,
Guatemala, Chile?

forget the millions dead
in nameless civil wars
or of preventable poverty and disease
in various hell holes
around the globe.

the rest of the world
may be sorry,
but not shocked:
they have come to know
the smiling murderers
we have become.

20 dead of madness in Connecticut
and the US wallows in drivel,
kitsch, hollow words,
self-pity, media frenzy.

a little arrogance here?

oh, we love our kids,
just no one else's,
so let's put black ribbons
on our cars
and call that enough.

Once again, the culture
of selfishness, greed,
shallowness
and patriotic stupidity
inevitably raises
its predictable head.

No country that murders
the world's children
with a shrug
should be surprised
when that violence
turns inward.

I am Vishnu
Destroyer of worlds
My name is Death

You can't have it
both ways.

We must love one another
or die.

   mce