Unexamined

Can we not dig below the surface

of our reverence for the men and women,

boys and girls who offer their hearts, lives,

and give up so much else to wear the uniform

and wield our nation's weapons of war?

Surely, a significant portion of that

lumped throat and trickling tear

comes from our amazement

at the courage welling up

in ordinary folk; from our respect

for service that sets aside self;

from the realization that battle

and all of its wicked cousins

accelerate the odds for mortality,

and those who volunteer to serve

are human barriers for our comfort zones.  

Safely tucked beneath that appreciation

lies another gut-wrenching:

the often-unconscious conviction

that armed conflict is not the solution;

the realization that there may

one day be a final war,

but it won't be the result

of a war to end all wars.

The universe's truth is that violence

cannot and will not end itself.

Even physics supports this premise.

This shadow emotion may be

the only hope to lead us along a path

to peace that has not been

irreparably rutted by war's machine. 

Photo by Mary Dumas Sgarlato

© 2014 Todd Jenkins