(This image is from sodahead.com.)As we prepare to enter a new year, my friend Brian provides us with a thought-provoking bit of poetry from his website -- Beej's Poetry Corner.
The Song No Longer Rings True
The sky still blue and spacious our fields grow golden grains snow capped mountains are still viewed in placid reflecting pools fruits and nuts are upon our trees but as for brotherhood between the seas the good has become harder to find our light has dimmed They came seeking relief from religious oppression only to convert and pervert what they found their freedom meant the abolishment of the ways of the new world they had come to with violence and death taking more land there was no self control no liberty no real law other than might made right for the new people did not honor their god and were deserving of death These were not heroes they did not liberate the peoples of this new land they showed no mercy there was nothing noble or divine in their treatment not of the peoples nor of the lands that they found They had a dream of great alabaster cities built them but today these are filled with empty dilapidated buildings the homeless and the violence that built them tears run down the cheeks of mothers and fathers losing their sons and daughters tears are shed by the victims of the religious extremism that was seeded in those early times How can we continue to sing America The Beautiful?The sky still blue and spacious our fields grow golden grains snow capped mountains are still viewed in placid reflecting pools fruits and nuts are upon our trees but as for brotherhood between the seas the good has become harder to find our light has dimmed They came seeking relief from religious oppression only to convert and pervert what they found their freedom meant the abolishment of the ways of the new world they had come to with violence and death taking more land there was no self control no liberty no real law other than might made right for the new people did not honor their god and were deserving of death These were not heroes they did not liberate the peoples of this new land they showed no mercy there was nothing noble or divine in their treatment not of the peoples nor of the lands that they found They had a dream of great alabaster cities built them but today these are filled with empty dilapidated buildings the homeless and the violence that built them tears run down the cheeks of mothers and fathers losing their sons and daughters tears are shed by the victims of the religious extremism that was seeded in those early times How can we continue to sing America The Beautiful?
