Building a Case for War

One that is very poor

based on scenes seen before

A sad and paltry place

where words are used to encase

giving an unpleasant taste

to all that's said.

Its specter fills with dread

a place of sanity fled

before the rhetoric of war.

Geneva's conventions are by far

and most, including us, ignored.

Made at conflict's end to ensure

in retrospect, our sanctity of life

idealistic protectionism

sweetened good intentions

salted with hypocrisy

both time and expediency

and war

I cannot listen anymore

to why we should intervene

take upon ourselves another's world scene

Lead the charge of morality

tainted with complacency

giving away what is not ours

the lives of our young to preserve

our sense of dignity.

Let others bear the burden

of democracy themselves

take its reins upon their shoulders

put their youth to its presses

That we stand not alone

and first

in meaningless words

well rehearsed

as we push them off - pawns across the

world of our kingship

Protecting not the purity of life

but the vanity of supremacy

Building a case for war

When there is none.

This was written after President Obama's speech to the nation urging a strike in Syria a few weeks ago - before the budget brouhaha struck - I thought it timely on a Sunday morn of bloodshed overlooking the taking of an ounce of blood for an ounce of blood. When are we justified? What is our justification? Usually a religious source, used to create a sense of the rightness of an action that is essentially wrong. And how do we reconcile these goings on? An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth - all preachers should preach on that one this morning, and help us find a place of comfort in it. May you find peace somewhere today, a little bit of it - not the solace of its placebo, but a true step toward achieving it.