The Virtues of War

Fire is hot
few want to burn
Safe houses
to live in
is what we all yearn.
Fast cars are dangerous
collisions cost lives
Speed in moderation
should give us all time.

Firefighters
fight fire.
Speed limits
save lives.

Now firefighters
fight fire
and that is fine.
But freedom fighters
fight freedom
most of the time.
For decades
with poverty
the State is at war
fighting ferociously
to beat down the poor.

Terror eludes us
an endless campaign
with weapons of stealth
against doctrinal error
non-whites are maimed.

Were all the battalions
the squadrons and fleets
to wage war against
wealth
what resistance they’d meet.

Dr T.P. Wilkinson writes, teaches History and English, directs theatre and coaches cricket between the cradles of Heine and Saramago. He is author of Unbecoming American: A War Memoir and also Church Clothes, Land, Mission and the End of Apartheid in South Africa. Read other articles by T.P..