Armistice Poem by Leo Briones

We walk barefooted on terrazzo floors.
In the chamber,
hear the echo
of Caesar's death gurgle
as destinies iron dagger,
adorned in emeralds and garnets,
slits the throat of tyranny.
We walk
bamboo below our feet
baffled by the sound of nothingness.
In the hallway,
Buddha meditates across the
rainbow swirl of the universe—
in-and-out; we wait for boundless quiet
only to hear—
on the breeze of the Cold War
the growl of the Cambodian sun bear,
who lays on a rock and listens
to the quiet but certain moan
of the skull strewn killing fields of Pol Pot.

We walk rock, dry grass and dust below our feet.
On this road to Golgotha,
beneath the screams and wails,
there is an eerie silence.
Perhaps the devil dances in the distance;
but it high priests in blue robes
who smile wryly before the people
and mock this last chance—
True God of true God;
why does the wolf so often kill its young?

and we walk
on shell casing spent
from tiny cartridges of death,
rockets of sandstone or shiny glass?
It is the same drone of hatred
that ushers in the next sun.

and what are we to care?

After all,
this is just war.

Kill or be killed.