War is Obsolete
by Michael R. Burch
War is obsolete;
the strange machinery of dread
weeps for the child in the street
who cannot lift her head
to meet the eyes of the damned
who failed to countermand
her soft defeat.
But war is obsolete;
even the cold robotic drone
that flies far overhead
has sense enough to moan
and shudder at her plight
(only men bereft of light
with hearts indurate stone
embrace war’s night).
For war is obsolete;
the bellicose “gods”, long dead,
have fled the dawning Light
while the true Sun, overhead,
has pity on her plight.
O sweet, precipitate Light! —
embrace her, lest the night
leave changelings dead.
For each ancestor lies
with his totems and his “gods”
in the belly of the night
that led him to his tomb;
but Love, the ancestral womb,
weeps still for the hope of Light.
Which child shall we kill tonight,
or which Mars condemn to the gloom?
