EUPHRATES INNOCENCE
Grateful for his ice cream
A Syrian child curves a smile,
...
Euphrates Innocence
EUPHRATES INNOCENCE
Grateful for his ice cream
A Syrian child curves a smile,
Innocent as a rose on the Euphrates
As it converges with the Tigris
Bombs, ice cream and innocence
Mark two rivers, drenched in history,
Where hunter-gatherers first
Slung spears for sustenance
Looking down on his father's grave
The child, smiling then crying, waits
Wide-eyed for more ice cream, or
Another bomb to rain from above
Mohammed, his name famous
In the scrolls of history, inherits
His father's hard-wired DNA of
Survival, in a broth of good and evil
His valley, hugged by humankind's
Two essential rivers, embraces
Mohammed and his innocent pleas
For peace and understanding
This wise child kneels towards Mecca
And prays for more sweet, heavenly
Ice cream, to be sculpted into bombs,
To placate our brutish world.
MICHAEL PIERCE - MAY 26,2016