HELL CANNOT, HEAVEN CAN WAIT: TWO POEMS FOR SLAIN CHILDREN AS COLLATERAL DAMAGES OF WAR

Magdalene and Sonia Stephen. Killed in Nigeria, Collateral Damages of War, The Toronto Star Photos

 

HELL CANNOT, HEAVEN CAN WAIT

 (For All the Slain Children Tagged
as Collateral Damages of War)

 

Heaven can wait. Hell cannot.

Cut them like flotsam and weed-traps
wrapping fetus and bloated carrion
bee-lining toward murky septic sewers.
Rhythm?  Abstinence? What eunuchs?

What controls cannot contain, infanticide

could quickly provide: terminate them,
abort them quickly before a trimester
germinates more burden; stop the plague
of life on a cranky dying planet.

When echoes of children’s laughter
could no longer be heard in a muted valley,
elusive peace and quiet would be there,
no duties to rear, no grain shortages.

Wars will cease from an attrition of warriors.

Old soldiers wither in unstocked barracks,
the draftees will stop coming. They have all,
all perished, in abortion camps, in famine
camps, in evacuation camps, in fire camps,
in garbage dumps, landfills, infirmary trash.

“God’s Act” will be stamped across records:

Avoid insurance runs. Save on Medicare.
They have been massacred before in the hills
of Bethlehem, the pillage written in Gospel
language as the day of the innocents.

Why can’t that be done again? No in vitros
will be possible, nor will it be allowed either.
No rhythm of swords. Just Syrian chemicals.
Nigerian suicide bombs, Somalian pogroms.
Do not copulate, depopulate, depopulate!

Pill boxes will bear this mandate. Absent
the plea for missing kids, more is better.
Children soldiers? What for? Kill. Be killed.
Hell will be heaven on earth, death is life.
Nothing will be everything. A Zero sum.

Wrath descended, Apocalypse has come.
 

---ALBERT B. CASUGA

Revised 05-21-2014

 

 

A LULLABY AT SUNDOWN

At sundown, on my hammock hour, I hum a lullaby.
And I become the magus among the cattails chanting:

O give me a home bursting with laughter and song,
O give me a nook to hide and hold quicksilver dreams.

In their crannies, I shall wrap them with sunflowers;
In icy snow chambers, I shall save slivers of sunlight
To keep them warm. I shall be the rabbit popped out
Of the magus’ cone hat, I shall jump and disappear

Into their hideaway taking the darkness with me.
In their lairs and tree houses, I shall bring dry flint
And candlesticks and all things bright and crackling;
I shall be with my wee ones and darkness be damned.


--- ALBERT B. CASUGA