Wednesday and once again 
I've not brought peace to the Middle East. 
I'm not even trying, other than swearing 
at the TV and calling politicians idiots. 
I have gathered twenty dead bees
in a jam jar, an interesting alternative
to potpourri, and dusted the deer skull
on the mantel. But as far as settling 
ancient conflicts, nothing. How do you think 

of history? As something in a book? A thing 
you said on a bridge once
about the water flowing past
while holding the hand of someone you loved
and all of it gone now, the bridge, the river,
the hand? When I think of the Middle East,

I see a bear that's eating a lion 
that's eating a wolf, see people 
trying to murder murders 
that have already happened, 
as if to kill a way back to the dead.
The desire for blood is the desire for life
and how do we put an end to that?
With missiles and guns? Rape?
And what problem is solved
by bombing a hospital?
Only the problem of not having enough evil
that needs to be avenged. I don't think the dead

need more neighbors and friends.
We could make life out of their deaths,
write books about their jump shots
and overbites, use their old shoes
to carry moonlight out of the house
and into the garden where it belongs,
form a choir of our crying. War

should be fought by people brave enough
to listen, men and women trained
to stand naked under white flags
in the wind and rain, to argue
and dream of more humane ways
to be human. This is only a fantasy
if it never happens.