More Antiwar Poetry

Sisyphus Shrugged did a great job of putting together all the people who posted a song/poem; I haven't had time yet to check out all the posts she lists but I intend to do so.

For several weeks now, I've been posting poems on Friday nights from different places but in the spirit of the moment I want to post something even if it's still early in the week. I would like to have added a song but I've been rereading a number of poems lately and here's a poem that seems to resonate with the moment.


The Price of War


If news people do not reach refugee camps,
does the lack of news mean lack of suffering?
If we do not see the caskets coming home,
does that mean the dying was not real?

If there are no photographs of torture,
does that mean the torture does not take place?
If journalists fear to leave their hotels,
does that mean there is no war to reveal?

Is suffering more than the empathy
we feel by chance when we catch a face in pain?
Is the reality of suffering
at the discretion of a Pentagon rule?

Is war a tough business that admits no mistakes?
When suffering is real, is it rationed,
is it a matter of taste in the daily news?
Is suffering a foreign policy tool?

If a president lands on a carrier
as a grandstanding publicity stunt,
does that mean the suffering is at an end?
If later, he says Bring it On, how should we feel?

Is suffering just something bothersome,
unrelated to our choices or us?
If there is no film footage of the dying,
can we presume that suffering is not real?

—CRT (2004)