A POEM FOR THE INNOCENTS (by Geoffrey Philp)

A killing moon peeks through leaves
of the trumpet trees in full bloom
for Lent, their barks still scarred
by the wild strokes of a machete
when my son tried to help me weed
our garden, overrun with dandelions,
carpeted with petals, a bounty of seed
and thorns, side by side, under clusters
of suns bursting through the branches.

Shadows flicker across the wall
over Buzz Lightyear’s grin, Mr. Potato
Head’s sigh, a collection of cards
and Harry Potter books under a map
dotted with the cities that fill his dreams.

What promises will I make
when I climb the stairs before
he falls asleep to the noise
of the television with cluster
bombs blooming in the sky
over Baghdad? What comfort
can I give him as I draw the sheets
over his shoulders, kiss his forehead,
when he worries that if he closes his eyes,
his aunt, Batsheva, half a world away,
will not rise from her bed in Gan Yavne,
thirty-seven miles west of Ramah
where Rachel wept for her children
because they were dead
and refused to be comforted--
who could stop her tears?

The map over his bed frightens him,
and I cannot convince my son
despite the miles and miles of oceans
and deserts that the machete he has hidden
under his bed will not make him safer,
any more than the sacrifice of innocents
will save us, for he knows,
he knows, somewhere
between the Tigris and Euphrates,
a wave of steel races toward Babylon.
March 22, 2003
© Geoffrey Philp