When a young man stood still,
To stop a tank on Tienanmen Square,
Did you stand up and cheer,
Did you protest with him – did you care?
When a young girl is gang raped,
In the silent violent Darfur night,
Do you feel her pain – her shame,
Do you shout at your leaders this is not right?
When a nation values truth and justice,
Then tortures a captive in a concrete cell,
Where were your values of honor,
Where were they as the nation descends into hell?
When you look at your image in the mirror,
What is reflected there that grasps your mind,
In the light of reason – the path of light,
Has it so dimmed that to reality you are blind?
When the newspaper white washes wrong,
Casting half truths on pages printed with soy ink,
Must you use it to wrap odious fish offal,
Or does the smell of their craft already stink?
When your leaders carp about their party,
The same words that Stalin and Mao once used,
And the Constitution is cast aside,
Are you with patriotic indignation infused?
When we become the animals in the chute,
Stumbling to a slaughter house Democracy,
We will draw the knife across freedom’s throat,
Held in the hands of our own hypocrisy.
Copyright: 2008, Donald Harbour
Donald Harbour Poetry 