Small brown child

BERIT LUNDH

Small and smaller faces
Deeply brown, profoundly sad
Dark and distant eyes
Intense and troubled, battered, mad
Little children fading, nothing joyous, nothing glad.

And there she crouches
Small brown child, beside a form so still
She lays her head
Upon the form and gathers all her might, her will
To say a prayer to gods unknown which angels might fulfill.
And bless her with a living home
With smiles and bread and not alone
And bring to life a mother killed
The small brown child dreams.

The small and smaller face of her
Afraid and where to turn
Her cheek upon her mother's hair
She pulls a carpet over them
As it begins to burn.

The bombs and fires and cries of war
Will not leave her alone.
The small brown child screams and screams,
But which man will atone?
The small brown child screams and screams
As war consumes her home.

Berit Lundh, a former Townshipper from Quebec, lives in Oslo, Norway.