Bombs bursting
City pulverized
“Are you there?”
Crushed under rubble
Hand sticking out
Limbs flying
Screams, cries, shouts
Thousands dead
Silence.
Across the dividing line
A mother cries
Did bombs hit my son?
Is he alive?
limbs intact?
God, keep him safe
Taken, thirty days a hostage.
Hospital crammed
White and red
Bloody body bags
Amputation, no anesthesia
Incubators, no power
Baby takes last breath
Grandpa wails, clutching her tiny body
kissing her closed eyes
Dad weeps, bent over shrouded son
She screams
Twin babies, both gone
Ten thousand dead.
Across the line
Little boy shudders
Is dad in the hospital?
Injured, with no pain meds?
Is he in pain?
Will he live?
Sixty days a hostage.
Cries of hunger
Limbs wasted
Muscles weakened
Bodies shrunk
Hungry children
Starving babies
Twenty thousand dead.
Across the line
She panics
Is my girl hungry?
Water fetid
Animal feed flour
Leaves, the only food
No power, no fuel
Is she in the dark?
Is she cold?
Ninety days a hostage.
Vital organs breaking down
Immune system faltering
Infections ravishing
Babies, elderly, the sick
First in line
Slow death, by starvation.
Across the line
they wait
they pray
they hope
they fear
four months a hostage.
Bombs dropped
food dropped
falling in the sea
parashoots failing
killing the desperate
food trucks roll in
shot at
clamoring for food.
He died at 10
Front page, the Times
Face of starvation
“All too easy
to trace the skull
beneath the boy’s face
pallid skin stretching
over every curve of bone…”
Thirty thousand dead
Buried
Some in graves, some under rubble
25,000 women and children
Be careful when walking
Tiny mound is a grave.
Across the lines
Families cry out
Bring them home
134 still a hostage.
The world watches
Two million tune in
Red carpet dazzles
It’s Oscar night.
