In Excelsis Deo Poem by Anne Marie V. Kennedy

I rest my head on your shoulder, dear.
Nothing can quell this pain.

I sing to my unborn child, but still…
Nothing can stop this pain.

My heart is wider, open, full—
But I think I’ve gone insane.

My bitter elbows touch the ground—
I pray, I pray, I pray.

I wonder why the earth is round,
And why I lived to see this day.

My heart is pumping eyes and skin,
And whatever else remains.

The very thought of breaking bread,
The peaceful overcoming dread,
The wise dropping his guns to say:
I am a believer on this day

Hurts my heart, tears my skin,
Turns my insides outside in.

The terror mystifying me
Will not repent and let it be.

The violence on the fallen snow
Darkens me, my skin, for evermore.

The evil on the hand that feeds
Is more than distant, more than greed.

Forgotten in our tender hearts
Is the simple and timeless art
Of killing one’s brother with one’s own hands
And saving the Madonna on which he stands.

Sparing the holy, the good, the true
Cursing the wicked; the Christian, Muslim, or Jew.

Reviled the foreign masses become,
Now you’re evil, now you’re done.

Forgotten lives on forgotten soil
Land on which our ancestors toiled.

The belief in freedom led to one
Who forgot the meaning of peace and love
Who forgot the words to the battle song
Who must now wonder what’s right or wrong.

My eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord,
But let them not see the dying
Begging to be spared from the sword.

The lies are swift and gentle,
So deceptively close to truth
You wonder how we survived the winter
In its good old-fashioned noose.

The flowers aren’t blooming, despite your wish to see
Blood on the battleground, a symbol of the free.

God doesn’t allow for justice,
He doesn’t allow for grace,
When the hands that killed the guiltless
Are avenged with might and hate.

The forsaken ones have perished,
Without name or face.
The fragile ones have fallen, Lord,
And it’s just another day.

The ring around the Father
Who suffered for our sins,
Who did not forget the prostitute,
The scorned among His kin.

He spoke of tender brotherhood,
Of mercy for the weak.
Would you not include the brothers
Now of whom we speak?

Justice is confusing,
Full of mirrors and disguise.
It is God’s way of discerning
The faithful from the wise.

To believe in the smoke and mirrors,
The shadow of God’s face
Is to blaspheme His true image,
One of mercy and of grace.

Graceful for the wicked,
Graceful for the kind
The God who knows no difference
Between the battle lines.

(9/21/01)