The 'Moderate' Middle

Shovels thudded into hard earth

So many it sounded like thunder

The men and women digging holes

For fence posts

Sweat drenched their clothes

It was hot in the desert

Scorched like all the people they did not notice

The line of them stretched horizon to horizon

Glittering like the diamonds in the sun

Born to take blood

And justify it as beauty

Behind them were children shrieking

Too young to know Grief's name

But well acquainted with its face

And its nausea

Their tears made them thirsty

It was hot in the desert

And the horizon kept all the water to itself

The dust stuck salt to their eyes and faces

As though they could make fertile soil

By offering their pain

And giving it an impetus

Before the hole humans were soldiers

Firing round after round forward

Trying to cure the cracking thirst

Of their homeland

Molten lead crossed heart lines

It was hot in the desert

And children's eyes saw metal for the last time

Soldiers unable to see the too small forms

Of those bleeding innocence into dust

For all the fence post workers

Hid them with bullet proof indifference

Cowering over her frontline child

Bullets pierce a mother's spine

Trying to protect her darling

This fatal time

All she thinks as she dies

It is hot in the desert

And she wishes terribly her blood was water

She opens her eyes and there was death

A grand waterfall to baptize life anew

With her child's hand is in hers

At last learns what clean water tastes like

Still, that horizon kept digging at Gaea

Like they'd find forgiveness

Seeking deep within the earth

For divine exoneration

They drank from their canteens--

It was hot in the desert--

And wondered what all the fighting was about

They scrutinized the upbringing of warmongers

The carelessness of the bodies in the dirt

As they covered them with it

The fencepost holes occupied by casualties

Of their civilized neutrality

While they poured plastic tasting water

Into bloodied sand and earth.