Do we not see, or do we choose the night,
Too blind to grasp the freedom of our light?
Must we believe the kill-or-be-killed creed,
That others wait to make our children bleed?
So we militarize, a frantic race,
Told it’s to guard a people, time, and place.
But who are “the people” when the storm is done?
The wealthy soar; the many are undone.

A father slays the neighbor for his bread,
Yet scorns the neighbor’s hand to strike in dread.
So nations bully, cloak their greed in might,
And call their theft a holy, desperate fight.
It’s not for peace their solemn flags are unfurled,
But for the veins of a reluctant world—
The minerals, the land, the right to reign,
To turn a sovereign home to captured terrain.

They speak of peace while loading another round,
A hollow prayer on consecrated ground.
For peace, you see, would end their bread and butter,
Deny the chaos from which they mutter,
“Protect us now!”—a self-fulfilling lie,
That justifies the power gained by cry.
And the Devil, in his blood-soaked, tailored guise,
Just smiles, for it’s the truth he most denies:
That paradise could root where poppies grow,
But war’s a crop they’ve learned to sow and hoe.

A child tests limits; so the powerful test,
How far they can transgress and still be blessed.
They learn that envy wears a loyal face,
That other states will bless the cruel grace.
So we support the killer’s rise to fame,
And call his bloody conquest by a name
That sounds like order, strength, and ancient right,
While turning from the unconsenting night
Of homes demolished, stolen lives and land,
A people scattered like forgotten sand.

And we, who sleep beneath a stolen sun,
Whose wealth is drawn from deeds we leave undone,
Ask not the cost. But will your conscience keep,
When those you’ve displaced come to your own deep?
For hell is not below, but here, made plain:
Father and son, a field of spilt disdain.
Neighbor with neighbor, locked in silent feud,
While belts are tightened on the multitude.

The veterans, too, become a cast-off shroud,
A few given a cloth to speak aloud
The very lies that sent them to the fire.
Which truth, then, sets us free from this foul mire?
When so many who could have voiced the cost
Have been eliminated, silenced, lost.

We live in light that others’ shadows bought,
And only see the truth when hope is naught.
Is it a fantasy, a child’s appeal,
To think that war’s eradication’s real?
But war brings profit, and the ledger’s paid
By those who work, oblivious, afraid.
So the deception holds, a gilded cage,
Until we turn from fear and turn the page,
And see the lie for what it’s always been:
The Devil’s garment, worn by greedy men.