Iraq

All
our civilisation mongers
lied
 
and more than
one million
died
 
*
 
Nor the first
mass-murder
mind
 
seek history
and you shall
find
 
many many
too many more
 
Empires
built
on blood and
gore
 
*
 
Singing arias
the
sorry while
 
in sombre
stupefacting
guile
 
grave liturgies
and solemn
rites
 
of liberty
and human
rights
 
*
 
As snakes
slither
and vermin
creep
 
as swallows
soar
and infants
leap
 
as (wo)men
work
 
and (wo)men
weep
 
I wonder
how
 
still wonder
now
 
how how

how do
they sleep?
 
 
[© R.Kanth 2023]

 
Professor Rajani Kanth, is Author of Coda (A Novel), A Day in the Life (Novel), and Expiations (Verse), and Farewell to Modernism (Political Economy Tract).