Your orders may come now,
or at 19h45 this evening.
‘Shoot to kill’.
‘Engage the enemy’.
‘Hold the line’.
‘Break up the gathering’.
‘Ready, aim, fire’.
But you have felt it as well,
the stab of hunger,
the bite of thirst,
the bayonet of loss,
the wounds of despair.
You have seen,
the pain in a mother’s eyes,
the grief in a father’s face,
the incomprehension in a child’s down-cast look.
‘Ready, aim, fire’.
But you, the nameless soldier have heard,
the cries of the grieving family,
the wailing of the widowed wife,
the quiet agonizing sound of the child’s weeping.
‘Ready, aim, fire’.
Your orders may come now,
or at 23h30 tonight,
or tomorrow,
or the day after that.
But you have felt,
the agony of a peoples’ simple desire for freedom,
dignity,
food,
peace,
employment,
for hope!
You have felt the stab being long bludgeoned,
the wounds of your stolen generation.
So when that order comes,
now,
or at 03h30 tomorrow morning,
‘Ready, aim, fire’,
let your humanity muzzle your rifle,
let your conscience dismiss the order,
let your human side come to the fore,
let the people in your gun-sights be akin to,
your mother and your father,
your sister and your brother,
your son and your daughter,
your friend and your lover.
Let them live!
Let them be!
Let your rifle fall to the soil,
O’ Nameless Soldier.
Amazing!! β€β€
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Thank you very much. Deeply appreciated. Peace and Equality for all βππ
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This one is a fantastic piece ππππ
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Thank you very much, friend. much appreciated and humbled.
Warmest wishes.
Peace and Equality for all
βππ
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Till human beings like you are there on earth, hope can never die and by spreading message of love one day we will overcome this hatred and brutality!
We will see that dawn my friend…
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you’re too kind, my friend – and I say as long as there are people like yourself – there will always be hope. Warmest wishes and Namaskaar.
Peace and Equality for all βππ
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This is a masterpiece Afzal! How true all this killing on order may have left the soul and heart of a soldier sour and dry. Who knows how he must have felt after killing a human being.
Love the way you connect and write so brilliantly!
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thank you very much, dear Meenakshi! as ever I am humbled and warmed by your kind words. indeed, when will the killing end – someone said that human beings are the only animals on earth who hunt on a full stomach. that pretty much says it all. BUT we struggle on with hopes of peace and tolerance and respect
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May be someday that time will come
Maybe somewhere that earth exists
Maybe this all pain is just an illusion…let’s hope one day we will live that maybe π
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yes dear friend, that is the hope and hope is a strong power and we hope that the power of hope leads us to change ourselves and then society and then the world – love must defeat hate. it simply must or else we as human beings will have truly failed
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