The Pain Of War Poem by Elizabeth Fowler

Looking out the window of my room,
I slowly let myself slip into the abyss,
Into a world where I cannot be hurt,
A world that only I myself can go,
A world that is not filled with the pain of the real world,
A world where my brother is still alive,
A place of solitude and yet not confining,
A place where I can still imagine my brother alive,
A place that if I imagined anything bad I could not be hurt,
In the vast emptiness I am able to escape the real world,
I can escape from the pain and sadness this war has caused my family,
The things that still today I cannot talk about I can face,
I can face them without fear,
Without fear of what people would say or do,
I can drown out words unspoken,
Words that should be spoken but are left unsaid,
For fear of what will happen,
Or fear of what would come of words that are spoken that cannot be taken back…
Slowly I am shaken out of the peacefulness of this world that I have created,
As my father calls me upstairs,
I slowly let myself come down from this imaginary world of peace,
And I grudgingly enter the real world,
A world where I can be hurt,
A world of pain, fear, and sadness,
A world where this war that is going on has left a great emptiness,
A vast sadness that doesn’t seem to end.
A great hole in the hearts of so many families, who have lost someone,
It’s not something that can be explained by words,
It’s not just something that can be ignored by so many who have felt the pain,
The pain of losing a loved one, or even a friend,
It may lessen as time goes on,
But this pain that I feel in the real world will never go completely away…