Poets Against War continues the tradition of socially engaged poetry by creating venues for poetry as a voice against war, tyranny and oppression.
Sarah Bruno
21 years old
I've been writing poetry for as long as I can remember. I'm currently an English/women's studies/African studies major at Albright College. I believe that the written word is the most we have to offer the world.
War is Not
War is Not
War is not a delicate procedure— it is not the cold silver of a stainless steel tray, in an operating room, upon which a scalpel waits, in anticipation.
There are no kind war gods who euthanize the troops before lovingly cutting them open to expose their red flesh, before pushing bullets, like buttons, into their hearts and stomachs.
Death is not a concerned mother who puts her children to sleep with powerful sedatives before she hacks off their limbs with sanitized blades, leaving them to wake to the real nightmare.
There are no sweet angels who sing to the glory of God while heavenly fire reigns down from the sky, burning everything in a sulfuric kiss.
Poets do not strategize and scatter dust on the battlefields, to make it seem as though a battle has been there.
We come after and we speak truth.
Sonny Came Home
Sonny Came Home
Sonny came home in a ten-gallon hat that Uncle Sam paid for and propped on his head— animated mannequin.
His face was as bright as any spangled star; his eyes lit up like fireworks.
He sat at the bar spouting jokes like a jack-in-the box, prompting the guffaws of the adoring men, telling war-stories (too vivid for woman-ears).
He carried on, from dusk to dawn. He stumbled home afterwards, fell asleep, face-first, on the lawn, waking to the amused, “Atta boy, Sonny” from the neighbors.
He taught the local boys how to shoot at tin cans, their shiny BB guns wielding sharp-shooter precision.
He told them he was a Marine (once a Marine, always a Marine), and in the Navy, there is no mercy.
The manicured-mothers approved— that is, until their sons started killing pigeons and other small creatures. Then they were told that they weren’t allowed to go to Sonny’s anymore.
But Sonny still laughed, playing like the world didn’t owe him a thing, saying he was proud to fight for God and his country.
But God, no one ever heard how Sonny cried in his sleep.
A Mother's After-Battle Cry
I covet the Earth, for my children, who she stole.
She nestles them now, in arms shaped with smooth stones, while I cry, lonely, through the night.
I envy the sky, for she suckles them now, with rainwater caught between crevices of granite, like little wells, while my own breasts grow full and ache from want of purpose.
I go wandering now. I throw rocks at the birds who attempt to settle on the soft turf, where their heads should be pillowed.
I shake my fist at the emptiness, which forms itself, like a knot hole, where God once stood.
And I speak to my children who were taken from me.
But I pity the soldiers who gunned my babies down.
With their hearts filled with lead and hate, they will never find the kind of peace that my children have found.
Dirt-clods
Dirt-clods
Boys are throwing dirt-clods, in a playground, that is shaped by iron fences, and resembles a prison yard.
They are pelting one another in the arm, the leg, the stomach, and worst of all, the already-smudged face.
I watch in horror, as they continue to shriek with joy when they hit their mark— and cry when they are the target.
Stop it! (I want to say). Just stop it! Stop and see what you are doing to one another, what you are doing to yourselves.
You are practicing violence. You are playing war. And your mothers are watching you.
They are encouraging you with their mother-smiles. They are telling you that boys don’t cry when you fall down.
And now I am screaming, I am waving my arms up and down in the air, like a wounded bird, and they think that I am a mad-woman.
I am running through the line of fire, using my hands like two small shields, trying to deter the blows that are beyond my control.
And these boys— these little boys— are scared, because I have just become the kind of person that their parents warned them about.
But I look down and see a red palm where I tried to stop a dirt-clod that some little boy had laced with a rock, that was intended for another boy’s head.
And now I am terrified, because I realize that it’s only so many steps to grenades, instead of dirt, bullets, instead of taunts.
It’s only so many steps from Uganda and child soldiers. It’s only so many steps from Iran and children hugging bombs to their chests.
We are only so far away from baby-blood, spilled like oil, into the dark dirt, which rejects nothing, which forgets nothing.
But now, the little boys are watching, and their mothers are yelling, and I am trying to tell them that they have misdirected their anger towards me—
that they should be angry with the state of the world, they should be outraged about a war with no end, they should be worried that their sons could be taken from them.
They should remember a time when innocence was worth something, too.
