JUST LIFE, I SUPPOSE

When I was young
Living in my happy little world
I used to wonder,
One of many idle wonderings,
Why philosophers were men
Of such a melancholy bent.

The doom and gloom
Surrounding me on every side
Never seemed to touch
The idleness of my mind
Or the quickness of my passions.

I wept as I read of war
But I knew such horror
Would never happen again.
It could not concern me.
I wore sweet innocence
like a bride.

Now I know of soldier boys
Who died in trenches in a war
Dead innocents en masse
I know how lucky I am
Never to have had to kill.

It seems a certitude of life
This need to kill each other.
War is greed,
Politics sanctified by religion.
Anonymous men in cold rooms
Decide who is to die.

While time sweeps into future
War is closing onto present.
I feel helpless
To stop the grief to come.
Just life, I suppose.

 

Dawn McDonald
© October 2002

Midi: "Le Bananier"
Composer: Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Sequencer: Robert Ungar

Art: "Destruction"
Artist: Jane Karchmar