Tag Archives: poem about war games

Nuclear Winter

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Nuclear Winter

Both winner and loser give voice to their regret,
for in this race to nowhere, there’s nowhere left to get.
Noting the deficiency of all that’s left to win,
they march around in circles, from here to where they’ve been.
Observing all the patterns followed from the start,
the trophy that they’ve won is, alas, a purple heart.

Prompt words today are winner, observe, regret, march, deficiency and nowhere. Image by Sharon Waldron on Unsplash.

Do you find this first comment on my blog ironic? This is a screen shot of my first notification, immediately after posting the above war poem:

Parasite

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Parasite

Mankind has been no bargain. They’ve scorched the living earth,
determined to exploit it to improve their worth.
Bargaining for diamonds, drilling for fossil fuels—
with each new excavation, proving they are fools.

They release noxious gases into the atmosphere,
and with each new admonition, shift to a higher gear.
Who will console our children as they forge ahead
following our example after we are dead?

We leave them with a dying world, and who is to blame?
First, off, those politicians who see it as a game
to increase their power in spite of consequences,
building up their war toys, strengthening defenses.

Extending greedy fingers, needing ever more.
Selling off our future, profiting from war.
While the wise men warn us, who in power listens?
Too busy filling pockets with everything that glistens.

 

Prompt words today are: fossil, scorch, gas, console, example and bargain.

Wars and Dogs and Teddy Bears

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Wars and Dogs and Teddy Bears

Cynophilists and andarctophiles are experts at collecting,
perhaps because they’ve flunked at other methods of connecting.
Wars are staged by countries that believe in hoarding arms.
Ironic that the means for hugs also maims and harms.

My recommendation is that those who make the rules
should be those sent to battle. Arm the presidents and fools
who start the wars—the despots and the senators and kings.
Then let them see what personal riches battle brings.

Let them take the chances fighting wars waged in their name,
so they are the ones slaughtered or made maimed or blind or lame.
The things that one collects should be what they are about
and what we put into the world be all that we take out.

Prompt words today are war, lame, arctophile, chance and recommendation.

Andarctophile, in cast you didn’t already know, is someone who loves or collects teddy bears. The term for those who love dogs is “Cynophilist”. And the love for a dog is called “Canophilia”.

Weekend Warriors: Wordle 524

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Weekend Warriors

As they mark off  the no man’s land with flags and chalk,
they warn their young brother he’d better not balk.
Then, battle lines drawn, my young monsters are off.
They huzzah and bellow and threaten and scoff.

As side one counts the time off,  twos drop to their knees
behind bushes and tables and boulders and trees.
Then, a hundred count reached, the enemy searches
the ditches and culverts and elm tees and birches.

Crows rise from the trees to caw and to hover,
betraying  those hidden and blowing their cover.
They rise then from where they’ve been crouching or sitting,
to begin their maneuvers of feinting and flitting.

Hiders still in hiding feel a hand on the nape
of their necks, that touch foiling their hope of escape.
Prisoners are taken and armies change places.
Hunted become hunters, continuing chases.

Over and over, this course is repeated.
Loser becomes winner but then is defeated.
Until one-by-one, they all are called home,
and the battleground’s empty below the night dome.

Star after star replaces the ranks
of small weekend soldiers and make-believe tanks.
They fall under covers, their moms tuck them in,
the dreams of their conquests now set to begin.

Prompt words today are battle, drop, sit, young, cover, monster, chase, table, count, times, zone and flags.

For the Sunday Whirl Wordle 524.
Image by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

The Comfort of Old Men

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Photo by Jan Abellan for Unsplash. Used with permission

The Comfort of Old Men

Children are sleeping sound in their beds,
inured to the missiles launched over their heads.
They’re used to the discipline of a cruel world
where bullets are served when the flag is unfurled.

They call it allegiance their country to serve
Old men sit at tables displaying their nerve
by setting out battle plans whereby the young
provide the chests where the medals are hung

that they earn facing death so the old men can gain
more gold that the young men pay for with their pain.
They posture and pose. They salute and they brag.
They call it a privilege serving your flag,

but none of the old face the bullets and fire.
It is not the aged men marked to expire.
Their rigors of battle are all of the head.
None twist to the impact of napalm or lead,

but war’s golden rewards are amassed in their pockets.
Munitions and guns and bullets and rockets
are the fruit of their plunder and part of the fun
they will buy from the profit they make from each gun.

This generation’s blood sweat and tears
will pay for the yachts of the rich and the gears
of the factories smudging the skies with their waste.
Air chokes on their vapors, the oceans all taste

their lethal remainders and sicken and die.
We have poisoned our water, our earth and our sky.
What is left once the old men have all had their say?
They will live life in splendor and the future will pay.

Prompt words for today are inure, twist, golden, privilege and discipline.

Conspiring with the Enemy

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Photo thanks to Nik on Unsplash. Used with permission.

Conspiring with the Enemy

Accoutered best for sabotage, they peer over the ridge,
intent now on the enemy crossing o’er the bridge.
All of their stealth and camouflage is not, at last, in vain.
Each inch they push their foes back is another inch they gain.
They’ve learned that cynicism of war as friend becomes their foe.
Each success they win will be another’s loss and woe.
His battleground littered with the corpses, G.I. Joe
now wanders off the killing field, choosing where next to go.
War is not Hell for those who are just playing at the game.
As war games end, the dead arise, as do the halt and lame.
Off to a game of baseball, the conquered and the winners
play together all day long until called to their dinners.
Children could teach their fathers that enemy can be friend.
Oh that their fathers felt the same and war was at an end.

The prompt words today are sabotage, cynic, vain, accouter and friend.

War Games

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photo with permission by Hasan Almasi on Unsplash

War Games

I’m not an island hopper, even in time of war.
Didn’t your mother tell you that’s what a basement’s for?
Wherever you may wander, wherever you may roam,
the best place to dodge missiles is right there in your home.

So reinforce your bunkers, store up delicious rations
so you can withstand war games of the leaders of our nations.
Naughty little spoiled boys who cannot learn to share
will not heed entreaties of those of us who care.

Even our democracy is ruled by a throne.
He gnaws away at joints of beef and throws us all a bone.
With no other agenda than playing at his game,
he does not know the difference between infamy and fame.

So build up your defenses. Reinforce your door,
for he and his rich cronies would profit from a war.
And all the brave young soldiers sweating in the sun?
He’ll take away their benefits after they are done.

Once the war is over, they’ll rebuild the world again
with their construction companies while they sit drinking gin.
Counting profits from the opportunities they’ve found,
they’ll enjoy their hillside mansions as we hunker underground.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/rdp-wednesday-island/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/05/29/fowc-with-fandango-war/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/your-daily-word-prompt-wherever-may-29-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/delicious/

No Peaceful Kingdom

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No Peaceful Kingdom

The dogs are in the backyard where they don’t molest the cats.
The cats are in the front yard where they monitor the bats
but do not dine on birds because the birds have given up
and all moved to the back yard where the young cats never sup.

The younger cats stay outside and the old cat lives within
and should the outside cats ever escape from where they’ve been,
when they’re inside, they’re  bullies and steal her food and tease her.
Although, since I can’t find a type of cat food that will please her,

it’s no problem for the old cat, yet those cats are getting fat
while every day there seems to be less of the older cat.
True, the older cat is crabby and swats the young cats first,
so it’s hard for me determining which cat is the worst.

I’m tired of these war zones. I wish they’d coexist,
and I wish that I could simply tell them to desist.
Yet with man and other animals, more often you will find 
they can’t exist in harmony with those who aren’t their kind.

 

Annie the crabby cat woke me up before Ragtag was online today, so they get their own individually prompted poem.  Their prompt was “harmony.” Here’ their link if you want to play along:  https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/12/23/rdp-sundayharmony/

Tin Soldier

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Tin Soldier

Petulant child, in a bit of a snit,
pooches his lips out. He’s having a fit.
He sets up tin soldiers in orderly rows.
Where they will be fighting, not even he knows.

Fast through the air, his tweets swiftly whistle,
delivering threats like an ICBM missile.
He casts insults northwards and south over borders
to Mexico, Canada and other quarters.

He’s saving his friendships for other bad boys.
With each fawning message his keyboard deploys,
he wishes their power were his for the taking.
Korea and Russia—what plots in the making.

His attention span just long enough for his tweeting,
he blusters his way through each conference and meeting.
Many are gap-jawed, yet nothing gets done
concerning disarming this smoking gun.

He’s expressing his own sort of odd concentration
by impounding children, expressing elation
that this will now curb illegal immigration.
How long will we let this man screw up our nation?

Daily Addiction’s prompt today is Gasp!  What better to cause us to gasp in the news today than our self-serving president’s recent horrendous action?

Update: okcforgottenman commented and added this video, which feels appropriate to this post.

If you want to hear testimony of those who have witnessed this separation process and to hear the voices and reactions of children as they are being taken from their parents at the border, then to be taken through a process by which you can easily reach congresspeople who can do something about it, go HERE.