new poem: mayday

mayday

what are we going to feel
when it’s us?

when hive planes corrupt
a sky above ducked heads

when water dirty
when thirst

when every utterance within earshot
italicized/ exclaimed

what when the ceiling tarpaulin
when sidewalk for hospital/ rubble for sidewalk

when sticky faces of neighbors
statistic

when all the home we knew
news now?

we will want someone to call it
war then

to mark our rowdy graves
by name & not circumstance

to imagine our eyes
beneath bull's-eyes

to spare the children
expired medicine

when will we realize
it's already us?

scrubbed & guilty
it has always been us

shopping & distant
it will always be us

bloodletting/ forgetting
can’t stop that it’s us

every life on this planet
reflect mine

every body torn into
every soldier shorn

every wall erected
every murderer mourned/ adorned

every death on this planet
expect mine/ implies us

so what
have we realized?

& how
are we feeling?

© 2011 by Lenelle Moïse