Martyrs! Poem by Eric Cockrell

martyrs...
silently trudging head down
to the promised land.
familiar?
a neighbor, a forgotten uncle,
the stranger you saw on the corner;
the faces...
bombing victims in the Middle East,
hungry children on foreign soils,
the kid picked up for looking suspicious.
the bullied kid that hung himself,
the family living in the backseat
of a car in Florida.
the tired eyed man standing
in the unemployment line.
the protesters, and the cops
with pepper spray and clubs...
the face of the young boy taken
from his drug addict parents...
bodies and faces,
souls wrapped in dirty flesh.
silently trudging,
martyrs!