* Dedicated to the Reservists who refused to take part
As you drive your treads
to flatten rubble,
crushing bodies,
rag dolls,
toys beneath bodies beneath walls beneath tables
beneath refrigerators
beneath your treads
beneath
beneath
do you relish victory?
Do you think collective punishment
a fair cop?
Or is it just another day’s work?
another day at urban removal,
another day’s bulldozing impediments
to the Lebensraum
of God’s chosen people?
Another family turned to parking lot
for future yeshivas?
Future delis?
Future statues to future heroes
of God’s own ethnic cleansing?
This poem is from Sam Friedman’s Grief and Rage: An American Jew’s Poems on Palestine. You can obtain a copy by e-mailing sam4wp@netscape.net.