Their War is Lost

I realise posting this is risky, either because it is contentious in its argument, and/or because it is overlong in its delivery! But I would welcome criticism of it…

You’ve seen its waves, green sea of flags -

like lifeguard warnings, line in sand -

that celebration can’t be banned;

free at last from prison cells,

but not the dark of status wrecked

in Gaza, West Bank, States for two.

From buried, rubble served as yeast -

fermented fervour saw release -

the certain, sure, waiver at screams

of desperate civilians,

and judgement call is probed once more -

it’s lost, if propaganda war.

More corpses pile, the dream is fuelled,

if pyre for some, a phoenix fire,

for refuge scene as burial,

and ideas rise beyond the pall.

When babies, old, some martyrs call,

then airstrikes fail to flatten hope.

The battle’s not of terror shot,

or hostages returned to flock,

but of untreated weeping sores,

the ancient olives chain saw cut,

but not the linking chain to past,

long stewards of the land cast out.

The settlements, unsettled routes,

forbidden joy for sons’ restored,

when all claim God but babies die.

they’ll not destroy, hardening hearts;

for tunnel vision recruits more;

the slings, Goliath felled, what means?

The 'terrorists' of IRA,

became the Sinn Fein of today,

united in one Ireland quest,

for Bloody Sunday proved the test.

The same as Palestinians -

the more resisted, more the growth.

Two thousand years, what’s here has brewed -

could Britain grant Kent to the few,

or cede Malvinas from the free?

But should we pass, hand mandate land,

so dispossess those native there?

At what cost is our gift now priced?