Until…

Until I visited the village of the dead
And saw
A stick thin woman pee in a pot for something to drink
A little boy tiredly eat grass as a vulture circled by
A young girl’s raped insides hanging out
A man, bereft of hope, with tears rolling down his cheeks
I didn’t understand

I never knew
Until I heard a woman’s animal cry
As scorched hands lifted her charred children’s bodies
from a shanty fire
Until I talked to a young girl who sold herself
For the price of a loaf of bread
I didn’t know

How could I know
When I hadn’t yet seen a child faint at his desk
From hunger
Or Women walking home from work in the middle
Of a dark night
Shivering from the bite of her angry chill
Until I saw these things
All I did was live for me

Until I walked in their shoes and cried their tears
Until I held the emaciated hand of fear
I didn’t understand the call of the revolution
PoP © 27 July 07