when the AK-47 happened ...
did you see us? we were either in the Mosque,
kissing the floor
or in the market,
buying fruit,
over and over, leaving wide open to the world the door,
wrapping ourselves in our arms in thought,
wearing our turbans or baring our heads to the great wind
without thought ...
***
that when the explosion did occur ...
did you not know? happily did we all suffer
to bring before the television sets of the world
democracy acting a little tougher,
raiding our homes, invading our lives,
scattering our poems, our dreams across the bow of the world,
singing its praise: duty & honor,
freeing up, to be sure, for the grave,
each and every Iraqi brother ...
***
for when the explosion did occur
between ourselves and the invader,
every child like a kitten did purr,
Death bragging a little later
to all the reporters whom it did stir,
how so thoroughly it did in the school
as before the innocent it was the tease,
laid out its crimson spirit as the pool
and suggested to Mother Nature disease
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