THE CHILD ON THE BEACH

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The child washed up on shore
In the same position
That he assumed
When he slept
Beneath the downy plume of a blanket
In the nighttime tranquility of a nursery
Which was regulated
By the barely perceptible
sound of
his little boy in and out breaths

Being only 3
He may have confused the
sand for his crib
And the rolling music of the ocean
For a lullaby
Or the heartbeat of
His favorite bear.

He wore a red shirt
Shorts
And a pair of shoes
That had barely gotten acquainted with
the ground.

His family had been denied exit visas
And their application for asylum in Canada
Was rejected
Even though they had family there

Because that is what
Governments do
In between
Spitefulness
And golf games.

Fearing for their lives
and the atrocities of war
Even though the mother had a mortal fear of
The ocean
The family decided to sail to Greece
Which was a mere 2.5 miles away from the
shores of Turkey

The tickets to freedom cost them $5,860.00
To ride in a flimsy plastic boat
meant for 8.

There were 16 people aboard.

Five minutes into their trip
They capsized.

The life jackets which were provided
Were fake
Because that is what criminals do in a crisis
Especially when there is a buck to be made.
They offer false hope
They lie
They kill without remorse.
They attack the press for writing the truth
And then they blame other people
without claiming any responsibility
as they preen in the mirror
And ask
who is the fairest of them all?

So when the whole world capsizes
like a flimsy plastic boat
And incompetent men
with bad intentions rule
innocents like little Aylan Shenu
that was his name,
Get caught in the crossfire
And never get their life jackets
Or ventilators
Or that invitation to dance at the
wedding of a son
Or a daughter.

Instead, they become part of a graph
Statistics without faces
Numbers without meaning
The contents of a body bag
Stacked on a shelf
in the overcrowded civilization of
a makeshift morgue

Or perhaps they become
A symbol
Like the soldiers at Iwo Jima

One indelible photograph
Whose image sears into our hearts
As a reminder
Of exactly what is at stake








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