Up to Their Ears in Tears


By Turlough
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Up to Their Ears in Tears
White bundle clung to a mother’s breast
The bleeding has stopped
As has the breathing
Carried on the wind across deserts
Her haunting wails of sorrow
For her land and baby Waleed
Al-Shifa hospital’s rubble arranged in piles
Supports a table that once was a door
Still bears ‘Maternity Ward’ in Arab script
No clean sharp knife. Without anaesthetic
Yusuf’s little-boy screams pierce the night
Amputating a foot, a surgeon weeps
Men in suits and power; some women too
Could stem the flow of children’s blood
Stop arms sales in the butchers’ bloc
Have they no hearts or ears at all
To hear outraged minds protest on streets
Those eighteen thousand infant deaths
Farah’s going to be a doctor
When she grows up
When they remove her bandages
When they rebuild the school
I wonder what does a little girl do
When she has no eyes to see or cry
Image:
A stop sign in Arabic and English. I took this photograph in Aqaba in Jordan in February 2022 on the day that Russia started its war with Ukraine. I thought it symbolic at the time, but maybe it wasn’t. Will they ever stop?
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Comments
Intensely moving and yes, the
Intensely moving and yes, the photo is perfect. I wish they would too!
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A very fitting poem for the
A very fitting poem for the awful situation, which has already gone on for longer than anyone imagined, and is only getting worse and worse. How can it have come to this? And why is there no solution?!
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Don't know what to say.
Don't know what to say. Thought I might quote some lines, then realised it is the whole of every part.
What is it doing to everyone? Those in there, suffering death, injury, loss because of the inaction of those outside; those outside constantly aware of this horror going on, not understanding how it can be swept to one side by politicians who have the power to stop it; the money and time must be going into police investigations on what someone said to a crowd at Glastonbury. Priorities so skewed while massacre is tolerated as "regrettable, misguided"
I think you are right, not to spew anger as I do, but to give examples. To move hearts with your words, to remind that it is people the same as us.
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Recently I have been shaking
Recently I have been shaking so much, and don't know, wonder if it is thinking of this. It is the trappedness that makes it seem worse, being held prisoner till agreeing to give up what's yours, being encouraged to this end by starvation, no medicine, no water, targeted bombings that kill thousands outside the targets, and those doing so NOT decried as the ones causing such terror in Sudan and other dreadful conflicts, but still described as having shared values, being allies. The doublespeak, doublethink.
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Very moving
Hard hitting and thought provoking, I enjoyed this.
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You've written a sensitive
You've written a sensitive poem Turlough, with honest compassion for those going through appalling, aggressive suffering.
I can only echo many others oppositions to such atrocities.
Jenny.
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I cannot believe how a race of people who suffered so much
at the hands of an extreme right nation can be hoodwinked into accepting a leader who has similar aims of wiping out another section of humanity. A leader who is so corrupt he is prepared to kill millions to prevent having to face charges against him.
The west shoiuld get over the guilt of the holocaust and put an end to this barbarism. It happened 80 years ago it SHOULD NEVER be allowed to happen again, regardless of who the perpetrator is.
Herr H committed suicide when he failed, I doubt Mar N has the cojones to do the same
Corrupt politcians are ruling the world stage now it seems.
It makes me sick to my stomach.
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Mr.N is supported by the most corrupt man on the planet
The man who has shown wannabe despots around the world you can break all the rules of decency and no one does anything about it. He's a corrupting influence and his cancer is spreading. All the while he is alive moral integrity will continue to decline.
This man is evil.
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stop indeed. I could say more
stop indeed. I could say more but when do we stop talking and start doing?
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