Would that I laid hands to pacify

Would that I laid hands to pacify

Whenever there was a need

Some say I have the gift

Whatever that may be

But so many need attending

Pain and suffering abound

I can only look upon them

A bystander, not a shepherd.

I stood next to a young man

Before he fell

Nothing more was left to say

His silence

The loudest thing I ever heard

Until a pin dropped

So many people lie waiting

No one knows their names

They were laughing at absurdities

Just the other day,

Except for those with

The trials of the

World upon their shoulders

Forgetting Atlas was a Titan,

Build a rocket boys,

Long-serving warriors

Old soldiers with worn out faces

Tired of the infighting

Lining dimly-lit corridors

Barely acknowledging their plight

Too accustomed to the fallout

Dust covered bodies

Giving makeshift capital

To the headlines

As the walls come down

About our ears

Nobody mentions asbestos.

I remember cheering

As the coverage was changed

We all thought we were due

A sporting chance

Until news came through

From the front-line

That death was soon approaching

It had been seen,

Leading the caravan

From behind

The inevitably of its arrival.

I bent to cover an open wound

In the belly of a beast

It brought me back to goat’s head soup

Delivered by an uber driver

High on the price of fuel

And I administered my oversight

Evenhandedly

Without excuse or any lack

Of sympathy

Commiserations for his loss

Were accompanied

By a health warning

Lead poisoning is more than lethal

When delivered at twice

The speed of sound

I said it again as he used a pencil

To write it down

I looked at what he wrote

And saw

‘War…Good God…what is it good for…