Proud Children

Burned, blackened, twisted remains,

Broken sentinels of a proud city,

Remind us of two days in May,

When, gray, black smoke spiraled up,

And hung in an already polluted sky,

Spoke of the suffering of the children,

Except for the favored few.

They, the favored, watched in anxious silence,

As if from some other place, somewhere,

Waiting for some mighty specter,

To grimly lay retribution,

Dousing the spirit of revolution,

It never came, it was too late,

Much too late in the day.

The proud children, called for a new father,

A strong leader, to light the way,

Their city writhed and burned, the final catalyst,

An urgent, demanding message, written in flames,

A call for freedom from oppression,

A time of Change.

They, the children, danced and ran amok,

Death and destruction their game that day,

They returned home with the spoils they'd plucked,

From the dirt, the dust and the fray,

The stories, they told, grew bolder with telling,

Strangely happy in the chaos they made.

A new order arose from the ashes,

The other and the favored swept away,

Not really the leader wanted,

But the time is one of constraint,

Children, proud children of the city, be patient,

As cities and lives can't be rebuilt in a day.

-- Pauline Khong 1998

Why?

Why is humanity so divided,

Can they not see,

There is little difference between,

For in all of mankind, blood runs red,

Two lungs to breathe,

One heart, one brain, we all have,

Bones, two hundred and six of them.

We run, jump, laugh and smile,

And we all, are of a woman born.

We can differ in our way of speech,

And there be differences, in color,

Of hair, eyes and skin,

Even within a single family,

It's not a sin.

Do we have the choice of race?

Or whether we'll be boy or girl,

We have no say, that is the way it is,

So why should we the human race,

Be divided, when no cause exists.

Whatever one's personal belief,

We all began, (in bible fame),

Either from Adam and Eve,

Or evolution, played its part,

We followed different paths,

Evolving separately.

From that point slight differences emerged,

To cope with environments,

Temperate, hot and cold.

If this had not occurred,

Humanity would not have survived.

So underneath the skin,

The only difference you will find,

Is that of woman and of man,

And if cultural mores are seen to be,

A way of making us, more interesting.

Why, then do we persist,

In creating differences,

That do not exist.

We are, after all, one kin,

Children of the human race,

So let us stop this madness,

Let respect and love rule this planet.

-- Pauline Khong 1998