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Ode To Afghanistan
by
Peter Sprenkeler
Oh Afghanistan tell us all,
To what depths you have descended.
When will your savage and violent days,
Be forever ended.
Your history is daubed in a lust for blood,
Diplomacy has gone from your thinking.
Corpses lie strewn in your stony fields,
Wide eyed innocents - lifeless - stinking.
Political and religious fanaticism,
Seems to be a way of life.
An unbending lack of compromise,
Responsible for all your strife.
Your own Holy writings denounce such ways,
And yet you remain so defiant.
An eye for an eye is set fast in your laws,
And upon them you are so reliant.
When will you learn you are intelligent folk?
The world owes much to your culture.
When will you stop behaving
As the Lion or the Vulture.
The world longs to be your friend,
Yet you resist all our best-meant advances.
You shun every welcome mat placed at your door,
Further minimizing your very slim chances.
To become part of this global family,
We all long to live in peace.
But you it seems have set yourself apart,
Violence never to cease.
We sit at the table of peace and goodwill,
With our arms open and extended.
Hoping you will sit among us,
To talk of death and violence ended.
We are your brothers but you will not admit,
The reality of this fact.
Your suspicions and doubts and fears,
Will not allow you come forward and act.
Your land is filled with famine and grief,
Mines and death and destruction.
You sit there in such misery,
You lash out at the world without compunction.
When will you see we long to help?
Your enemies we don't long to be.
There are so many ways we could be a friend.
Please come to our place for tea.
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