collateral damage

Posted on September 17, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

when the dust lifts
count the bodies

subtract
the one you wanted to hit

and tell me
if the others are any less dead
through non-intention

this is a math
I will never understand:
the sine, cosine, and collaterals
of damage

About Susan L Daniels

I am a firm believer that politics are personal, that faith is expressed through action, and that life is something that must be loved and lived authentically--or why bother with any of it?
This entry was posted in New Free Verse and tagged , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

19 Responses to collateral damage

  1. Pastor Bryan Lowe says:
    September 18, 2013 at 12:12 am

    Someday, all our kings will be poets.

  2. cloudfactor5 says:
    September 18, 2013 at 12:48 pm

    Just thought I would say this is the first time your blog loaded quickly for me ???Maybe it was because I tried through the wordpress reader, Normally your blog is the ONLY blog I’ve encountered that will not load on my computer besides many of the other eblogger blogs which normally will not load. I feel it is because there are google demons at work, and I’ve been having such problems with google that just the other day my friend suggested I shut everything down, which I did and since then I have not logged back into google and now your blog loads right up, how strange ey ??? Just thought I’d take a moment to tell you why I haven’t been able to read your blog for so long.

  3. Alice Keys says:
    September 18, 2013 at 12:58 pm

    Susan, This is fabulous. I love to read protest poetry. Good work with this one.Poetry does this better than a straight-shooting essay. Thanks. Keep us thinking. alice

  4. charliezero1.wordpress.com says:
    September 18, 2013 at 2:08 pm

    wow!!! Susan, this poem hit me right in the jaw.

    Powerful! and a question to mans humanity of killing and how many. You are a true poem of words. 🙂

  5. jomul7 says:
    September 18, 2013 at 2:11 pm

    and worst of all no one gets punished for it!

    • Susan L Daniels says:
      September 18, 2013 at 6:51 pm

      That’s the worst part of all. This can be about drones. This can be about poison gas. This can just be about “traditional” warfare. No matter how people die, they are still in the end as dead as they can get, and that is the crime.

  6. I HAVE A VOICE says:
    September 18, 2013 at 7:22 pm

    So much shocking reality!

  7. nelle says:
    September 18, 2013 at 10:06 pm

    Nor I. Tragedy has a long reach, and it cuts our souls deep.

Comments are closed.