This one has perhaps more passion than art, but I present it anyway…

“Till We Cherish” (“For we have heard of .the love you cherish for all the saints.” Colossians 1:4)

(Written after hearing of the attack on Irish-Catholic girls on their way to their private school in Protestant territory. September 5, 2001)

Scores of Irish schoolgirls in uniforms and smiles marched double file with mothers for guards and militia for escorts;

Scores of Catholic schoolgirls crossed the protestant sea to sanctuary at their private-island school.

Scores walked through shark-infested anger toward their haven when thunder broke from stoops and porches, behind barriers and blockades, The cowardice and hatred of well-dug protestants cracked across the sky in barrages of stone randomly aimed.

Shaved heads mocked the covered innocence of lost laughter as our babies cringed, our daughters trembled as a single bomb brought no one to their senses.

At the blast the whole world gasped, froze, blushed and should have vomited at our purity so polluted.

The neighborhood oceans still hated and the slight island students still wailed at the howling the centuries plastered on their faces.

How long must schoolgirls quiver at September? How long must they trust the soldier’s shields?

How long will graffiti be the language and explosives be the punctuation of grammar school children

Who could be our daughters?

How long will percussion cap nighttime dreams and daylight renew the terror of first day jitters in the land once so quiet in Christ?

How long till we cherish Life more than Ideas? How long till we cherish Breath more than Success? How long till we cherish Laughter more than Language? How long till we cherish Safe Haven more than we cherish Settling the Score?

How long till we cherish?

weary, mark p.