LET US PREY

Let us kill the children

so the children will not know

How we solved the problem

when the hate was all a-glow.

Let us kill the women

so the mothers will not be

There to greet our children

should we ever set them free.

Let us kill the elders

so their history is erased.

Let us kill the farmers

so the crops won't be replaced.

Let us kill the spirit

that enraged us on that day.

Let us kill and hate and kill

"Till we become as they".

John G. Lawless

Comments: 6

Mary C L. Sep 10, 2006, 2:52pm UTC

oh is that ever so good-- serpentine

that's excellent writing

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Stephen McAllister Sep 10, 2006, 4:11pm UTC

Wow, this is powerful John. Excellent.

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Cheryl W. Sep 10, 2006, 4:46pm UTC

Very powerful, John...

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John F Walter Sep 16, 2006, 3:55pm UTC

John,
This is as powerful as your poem about the forest fire, if not more so. It is both rhetorically passionate, with the iterated trope "Let us kill" deliberately creating an overkill effect that effectively bludgeons the reader with your irony, inducing the desired effect of powerlessness and anger and it is eloquent and true in its own outrage.
I particularly liked, "Let us kill the elders/so their history is erased."
Superb craftsmanship effortlessly supporting high dudgeon in ironic statement. This one was worthy of W.H. Auden.

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John L. Sep 16, 2006, 7:38pm UTC

thank you all again for your kind words and comments.

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LET US PREY

Comments: 6

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