GAZA… Of Paradise Despised And Lives That Bought Into A Lie

                                                       Rafa in the southern Gaza Strip - Reuters / Hatem Khaled

Devastation

All around…

Blighted spirits weighted down

On bended knees

To hierarchies

Of powers in conflict that compete

For the loyalties of those oppressed

By the hardened heart of wickedness

And their own sense of void…

Wanton

Wasted

Brokenness

That looks at life through blood-tainted eyes…

Rancid stench of wretchedness…

Dark arresting passions

Of a sinful nakedness

Raging red

Till death and hell

Confirm the dread-full truths

Of paradise despised

And lives that bought into a lie…

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

And when we sorrow for the lives of our children

Who indulge in the violence of their mutual despair

Will our tears yet quench the barrenness

Of this heated state in which we live…

And can we stop this crimson rain…

This predestined clash of conflicting loyalties…

If we replace the shanty towns

With fertile places unconfined…

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

And on this rise

From which we survey

The woe-begotten aftermath

Of a Megiddo inspired conflagration

We retire to wipe our tears

And find a place

To build a house of hope

Through which flows

The eternal spring

Of that love…That softens hearts…Restoring hope

And heals the brokenness of every passionate soul