[The Cedars of Lebanon, steel engraving by J. D. Harding after C. Barry, 1835]

Lebanon is laid waste.
I need no bible-toting prophet to remind me
that someone’s long silent God gave the order
to saw through the last cedars.

The litany of woes crosses the Litani
but no bridge is left behind to burn,
just the kindling of ersatz-born leaflets that first say “Flee”
then demand “Stop,”
but really mean “Do not breathe, we own the air.”

Katusha rockets veer south and Israeli tanks crush north
with no child left behind,
some blown away, some pulled from the rubble
others tucked away in chambers far from the trouble
and one too many left to drink milk turned into blood
from the last supper at Qana.

In this matrix I do not recognize the world I wanted to know.
I have lost my balance, not knowing how to turn.
Right seems as lost as wrong and I am left
blinded in the glare of this self-righteous mess.

Love and hate, life and death
these foes have ceased to be opposite,
only held together in meaninglessness,
born again and dead again as mere words.

I, too, am short of breath,
fumed to death by the poisonous blindness
of a world outside me immune to human suffering.
My tears these days are only salt
and Darfur but a distant mirage
as I close my eyes
and pretend sleep brings peace.

Is this all the dream of Zion offers those who wail over their own loss, Mr. Olmert?
Are the Prophet’s words dearer to you than Allah’s love, Shaykh Nasrallah?
Is this your higher Father’s idea of democracy, Mr. Bush?
Is this the Armageddon you wish on us all, Mr. Robertson?
Is this by design, good God of our vengeful forefathers?

When the last cedar falls,
who will hear the dying sighs?
Who will scatter the ashes to the wind gods
who cover our sins
and allow us to imagine
we are too civilized
to be naked again
and again?

Not the God you call on.
Why should He waste His time
when we damn ourselves
into silence?

Daniel Martin Varisco