Waging Wars and Battling On - Summative Poetry

    We choose our battles, while others are thrust upon us

    We travel and seek out the things that inspire and remind (us)

    Who we are. What we do. What we think and believe.

    

    Poverty, yea, hunger, is a pickle-

    Wars and battles of lifetimes and personas

    

    The endless bouts of slavery and wages and work/power struggles

    

    We visited the humble cabin of one great president, struck down in hatred,

    Whereas we pay a handsome stipend for a tour of an earlier national leader, who

    Owned hundreds, and sired children with at least one of them, a girl from youth,

    Sally, whom he convinced to return from Europe, with promise of freedom

    For their children.

    Their children.

    Theirs are ours; we have inherited a legacy of love and hate, 

    Toil and prosperity

    Powers and divisions.

    We, the greatest country in the world.

    The most powerful the world has ever seen, ever known.

    We alight the streets in rage when a poor man on drugs was abused

    Mishandled and killed by police.

    Now locked up for the foreseeable future.

    It is 2023. A cold, but sunny and somewhat restful Saturday...

    For many of us.

    Go to places on the map and there are battles:

    Israel, where settlers and residents take one another's blood

    Missiles launched

    Across the border in Syria, the factions continue to shoot and push one another.

    U.S., Russians, Turks, and Iranis push their forces

    Some might call it the Great Power Game, going on hundreds of years

    Where else?

    Fighting amongst the cartels of Mexico, which is lamentably typical

    Blood-letting among our U.S. gangs

    Shots and bullets killing more than even the active shooters

    Of which there are not a few

    There are Islamic jihadi movements in Africa, at least 10 countries

    There is the infighting of post-Western Afghanistan

    

    Some are actively writing books on such

    While the Yemeni cannot reconcile their quarrels

    Davis, Lee, and Jackson tried to keep their own lifestyle

    

    But it was not meant to be.

    Are we all power-hungry racists?

    Are we getting better at helping the least and unempowered among us?

    

    Do Marx and all the socialists have the answers?

    Does anyone?

    A religion, a leader, a movement?

    

    We will continue to wage these wars and battles for the time being.

    Wage on, soldiers and troops.

    Do your best.