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(for those who march against war)
All the flowers
flying out of your mouths
are dead,
the air has killed them,
someone has poisoned the air,
all the 1960’s flowers,
can’t you see them as you march thru the grass,
dead flowers deadly flowers
.....................
How much will you sacrifice for peace?
Enough to leave those pretty parks
go by Saint Paul’s Church and
stare into the dead night of a windowless
building’s charred remains
till you see people’s flamed wings
spread out as they leapt
and you feel your own skin
burning so bad, you’d kill to stop it,
do you want peace enough
to look at every photo of those missing
since September 11th,
read the rosary of names aloud
as you once read the names of
the South American “disappeared,”
marched and petitioned us to help
those in Somalia, Bosnia, remember,
even went there, some of you,
risked your lives for them....
More than 3000 dead buried
a few miles from where you live
homes some of you left in fear
afraid to return
breathe air makes you sick,
toxic excuses... only
the allergies asthma are real
and the nightmares you wake trembling from,
are you willing to descend into hell
till you cough up all the dead fairy-tale flowers,
your eyes blaze with anger
at what was and isn’t
and is, now....
you’ll do anything, yes even wage war
to keep this from happening again,
do you want peace enough
to look at a picture of Hitler
and admit that innocent people died then
so you can live now
stop marching long enough
to look around at your city,
imagine one woman taking a plane
one man entering his office,
you’ll do anything
to keep them alive
this city you love, safe
how much do you really want peace?
.....................
Look at all the flowers,
dead flowers... deadly flowers
©2002, Linda Lerner
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Decades ago, returning vet
you flung your medals at the White House,
I fling words on a page now another war
you’d be protesting with me
if I wasn’t protesting your death.
Learned in Vietnam
to know the real enemy the dead:
marching into jungle swamp deserts
reciting “the lord is my shepherd"
the dead: we surrender our souls to every day.
You saw with your own mind
heart’s eye didn’t need
a politician doctor bossman
telling you how to live
breathe compromise or when
death had you in its chokehold...
having known Long Bînh Jail’s torture*
you wouldn’t accept a medicine man’s for
some zero quality time.
Your penis computer animated
my coffee mornings
those last months...
see how big alive--
and growing even bigger and
“wanting is the hottest sweetest thing you know”**
outlasting every kind of war
all the broken promised moments we had
and couldn’t keep....
so when your daughter wrote,
he passed away
wasn’t you, my love... a dead goodsoldierman I saw
or ever see...
not you at all
*largest military stockade in Vietnam
**“love at first sound” by Andrew Gettler
©2003, Linda Lerner
Linda Lerner is the editor of Poets on the Line & the author of six collections of poetry. Three of her poems appear at Poetz.com, and six more poems were published in A Wise Woman’s Web.
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