Anti-War Poem — Second Ode to Disarmament

Second Ode to Disarmament

Each order each line of command

each siege-besiege counterpoint,

a percussion of shelling and wounding.

 

Till the last body the last round,

the mincemeat slurry of nation and body,

of flesh and ideology, bird memory in a bunker.

 

To be unlived to invest in a living future

relegated when the time comes: the way

we talk in D minor at ease or under pressure.

 

Each order each line of command

each siege-besiege counterpoint,

a percussion of shelling and wounding.

 

War loves its clichés, its brutal

realities. ‘According to some sources’.

Doctors without borders sewing limbs together.

 

Till the last body the last round,

the mincemeat slurry of nation and body,

of flesh and ideology, bird memory in a bunker.

 

Where to gather seed in a resplendent season

of memory, where to look when the season is harsh.

Under the barrage the dawn chorus loses its way.

 

 

            John Kinsella