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meditation for an escaped mother

your hand reaches out
through the heavy light of
indian summer to
hold mine

your scars are beautiful

have i written these lines before?

probably
but they're worth repeating

i find you too often
in tears

am too often the cause

a quiet man
wasting his life by wrapping
each day in a thin layer
of words and
what i end up with is a past
dissected beyond
recognition

the threat of winter in
an unforgiving land

and what can be left for any of us
after this woman starves
her four month-old baby to death?

who will step forward to claim
these young girls being
raped and filmed
in the name of profit?

you understand that
the questions are more important
than the fact that they cannot
be answered

you understand
how easy it is for violence
to become its own
religion

christ is only the
most obvious example

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