David Harris - When Will They Ever Realize

The sound of silence filled the air,
just before the dawn.
The sun’s streaky fingers stretched
forward on the fading night sky.
I walk in desolation,
for reasons I know not why.
The chorus of the morning birds
has yet to break the spell
of the unstrained silence,
which on everything had befell.

I tried to remember yesterday,
when the oyster of the world was mine.
I tried to see the smiling faces,
of those I loved and left behind.
The war was not mine or theirs,
but always someone has to go,
to do the battles for the sake of someone’s word.

An order given by a faceless person
and thousands throw away their lives.
There is no reason given,
and the faceless one doesn’t hear their cries,
of all those who fall on battlefields.
Giving up their families and their lives.
They call them cowards, those who refuse,
to follow orders to commit suicide.
There is no adventure in dying;
in a place, you cannot pronounce the name.
There is no glory in suicide,
but wars make men do it just the same.

When will they ever realize,
wars make no difference at all,
except to make rows of white crosses,
as memorials to those who had to fall.
I shudder at the sounds of the guns,
breaks the silence in my ears.
Will my loved ones before the days end,
be among those to shed tears?


13 March 1984

David Harris

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