The Sound of War

I heard the mother crying The child awakened at night The father afraid for his family The leaders screaming their anger The villagers walking in the snow at night The refugees exhausted and afraid to never return to The houses trembling with collapsing walls The hospitals filled with blood, wounds and pain

I heard the silent voices that will never return

I heard the Geese flying away The Deers running far deep in the forest The Trees burning and crackling, falling The Bees smelling the flowers burned The Rabbits digging deeper into the earth The Crows flying left and right with nowhere to go

I heard the silent voices that will never return

I heard the river crying as she carries bodies The old rocks and bones crushed by the tanks The mountain bombed open in despair The sky on fire, cut and bleeding with laser-sharp planes The wind carrying the smell of death across the world The earth sobbing with all her children wounded

I heard the silent voices that will never return

I heard the deep longing to belong I heard the silence of unearthed grief I heard the fake promises of Peace and Truth I heard the sound of the wounded old souls Screaming their pain through weapons of destruction I heard the cry of love in the silence that followed the sound of war I heard the sound of the prayers shielding tired bodies from the horror

I heard the silent voices that will never return

I heard my pain and despair for the world I heard my own grief for the unresolved trauma I heard my desperate attempt to love through my wounds I heard a deep calling for a different way I heard God's crying with tears of compassion

I heard a call for love that did not know where to go,

I heard the silent voices that will never return.

I heard the sound of war.

Angell Deer