The Importance Of Understanding

Many times I have asked myself
what is a war made of?
Is it the sands of time shifting?
Is it the inevitable stage of the
Universal Soldier as he towers
over humans
en masse
like Gulliver in his travels,
making puppets out of fighting men
in their glory?

I wish I had answers.

The whole world faces deep problems
when war occurs,
and we, America, are there to fit the
battle no matter the cost.
We take hatred in doses,
measuring just how much is lethal,
expecting a cure-all for a sad,
pathetic graveyard when a war is over.

Do we know what we see?
Or are our eyes blind to just what
we want to see?

This year, our strengths were questioned,
we looked as desperate on the map
as a pack of wolves howling
desperately in the night, not
sure what hit, or what to do with
its sudden injury.

We must certainly have tears for the
predicaments we get ourselves into.
We must learn to understand ourselves,
take the precautions of sloughing off
the thick skin of a dangerous cobra,
rid ourselves of the poisonous legumes
of war
by asking what we all know we want to:

Can we help others to understand
as we sacrifice ourselves for the good
of all?
Can we bring ourselves to the ultimate
task of dying for a cause?