What softness lends to baby’s feet,Movement in life’s yielding lips,
In petite and gentle fingers,
Blue bird suppleness,
Noiseless radiance.
Stop.
And open your eyes.
Tender turns of the head,
Small smile under red cheeks,
Soft hair waving down,
Engaging wonderment.
Stop.
And open your eyes.
Arid guns at the steady aim.
Rifles do not grapple with verdicts.
Who is guilty?
Aren’t we all?
Stop.
And open your eyes.
Infection of oppressive thought,
But the law cowers not in fear;
It is man that has wrought
the undoing of truth and breath.
Stop.
And open your eyes.
Perhaps the child of ideas
or the youth of convention
might answer my query;
Will dying take wing?
Will our dead child be familiar?
Will the wet breath of malevolence
toss water upon our infertile tree?
Will the soul of our nation kill her child?
Stop.
And open your eyes.
Will the children of this world
give rhythm to the drums of war?
Will the baby’s supple feet
move to the beat of tawdry battle?
Will war leave tasteless, life’s yielding lips?
Might, instead, the petite and gentle fingers
make a music of warless magnificence?
mrp
Woman On Trial For Killing Her 8 Children
