The night is still; my city sleeps in peace;
No bark of guns, no shouts or screams, no smashing glass, No pall of smoke, no troops or rioters rampaging. Poverty is here, but naught of war, and we have freedom. I wake and listen to the silence,
Pray for those who wake to terror,
Wake to the rattling of the guns,
Wake to kicks and curses of state soldiers,
Wake to the drone of warplanes overhead,
And the scream of bombs descending.
The bombs are ours, the bombs that we let fall
To cast a pall over the lives of innocents in foreign lands.
What is it in men’s hearts that lends them to destruction? Mothers, when our sons are at our breasts,
Does the milk that nourishes their veins contain the food of hate, The leaning to destroy, to slay, to bully and belabour? If so, whence comes this putrid poison?
Does it spring from our own breasts?
If so, then, Mothers, when others’ sons lie dying in the streets, Why does not our hate die?
Let die the thirst to right seen wrongs.
Weep for all that die when soldiers die,
For when they die sweet innocents die with them.
Bombs and guns cannot wage war for peace.
Wars on terror only fuel the flame.
Fighting for freedom fosters only fear.
Only love can turn hot hate to loving.
Only empathy moves murder from men’s minds.
Mothers, empathise with other mothers.
Let’s pledge our sons who may aspire to sit in state To see into the eye of any enemy,
To search his soul for similarities,
To see him as a brother.
It is up to every mother
To breed love of every other
In the heart and soul of every son and daughter,