POEM: Even The Doctors Cried

 

Even the doctors cried, they said.

Even the doctors, their emotions

Cauterised by having to deal

With endless

Lines of hopeless cases,

Even the doctors,

With their dead eyes

And blank expressions,

Kalashnikovs slung over their shoulders,

To stop the gangs of hungry looters

Coming to the hospital to steal

The food from the dying patients,

Even the doctors cried, they said

Because he was so beautiful.

 

The boy lay on a filthy towel

His arms blown off, his eyes

Vast pools of bewildered

Fear and nameless wonder,

All his loved ones reduced

To collateral dust, his universe

Collapsed, sucked back

Into a big bang

Of dying stars in reverse.

Even the doctors cried, they said

Because he was so beautiful

 

All the boy could see

Was a blur of flashing cameras.

Each syndicated photo flashed around a world

In awe of him

Because he was so beautiful

 

The commentators crowded round him

Bidding for first preference on his soul,

Because he was so beautiful

 

Even the doctors cried, they said.

His face, radiant

His eyes, focused

On a land

So far away, glimpsing

A picture that cannot be taken

A soul

That cannot be stolen,

Blinking

In the glare of the unforgiving

Camera eye.

 

All he could see were the bright

Faces of angels,

Waiting in paradise for him,

Waiting to deliver him

From this waking dream.

So he could live for ever

With his father and his brother

And his beautiful mother

Dancing in the never ending

Light of Allah’s eyes..

 

Even the doctors cried, they said.

Because he was so beautiful.