Listen! Drones are coming!
You can hear their engines roaring.
It is pointless to take cover.
State-sponsored terror is overhead!
As bombs strike their targets,
screams of horror, agonized cries of pain,
fiery flames, hot puddles of blood,
billows of smoke, thick clouds of dust,
corpses dismembered, body parts scattered
amidst the debris and smoldering rubble.
Filling the air, a fetid stench,
the acrid smell of burnt flesh.
Mourn the luckless victims.
Lament the civilian carnage,
so easily dismissed as
only “collateral damage”:
fifty innocents sacrificed
for every “terrorist” slain.
Among the star-crossed thousands,
hundreds of martyred children,
their laughter silenced forever.
Feel the sorrow! Share the outrage!
Understand the desperation!
Condole with anguished survivors:
inconsolable spouses; grief-stricken
siblings; aching-hearted parents;
orphaned and traumatized children.
Like hovering mosquitoes, heard
even when they can’t be seen,
the predator drones keep coming.
Listen! They’re buzzing overhead!
Who can stop this senseless slaughter?
Who can halt the little Eichmans
whose computers, twelve thousand miles
away, dispatch the deadly drones?
Who–oh who–can turn back the tide
of an overfull sea of blood?