The British Parliament recently voted not to take military action on Syria. But despite  this, its Western ally the United States continues to linger between action and in-action, along with other nations. Meanwhile, on the ground, the atrocities continue.

This poem speaks of the chemical warfare being used in Syria and calls, if not for military action, for negotiation between all combatants.

Absolute measures

What nerve

does Sarin gas have to scorch

the air we breath?

Where leaves and white aves,

like a fallen angels,

fall to the earth and sickeningly seethe.

And as these streets lie cold and broken

are not the people a token of this land’s displacement?

All the while a silent hisses descends like silent rain

carrying a malicious, froth-corrupted pain.

And as the West spreads blame for

the chemical death it refused tame,

in some remote, inhabited plain,

humans huddle in ruined shelters

awaiting the next bomb, the next  hisssss

to blanket the land they once knew with bliss.

© Jonathan Rowe 2013