SOWING AND REAPING - PART 4 OF 4

To a "precarious" world in a most "precarious predicament"!
Now that I got my wish and we invaded this ancient Babylonian land
How many lives I wonder must we pay for this one man?
My years are stealing apace and death is drawing neigh
I'm frightened! Would I go down to the pit or with the Lord on high?

With so many lives maimed and so many others headed for the grave
Was my vengeance a cowardice, or can I call myself brave,
Intoxicating vituperation we constantly proliferate
Expounds our vengeance and our will to subjugate

Our well trained troops and sophisticated munitions
Are inadequate against the insurgency and suicidal retaliations,
The mass media display of explosions more and more
As we continue to kill the innocent on that distant shore

Why did I sow seeds of such vengeance, revenge and hate?
When death awaits so many of our soldiers at Baghdad's gate,
President Kennedy said, "it is never too late to do the right thing"
Our moral course, the troops, home we should bring

But for me this is a choice I could never consider
Because for twelve years, quest for revenge caused me to suffer,
After all, what would be written in the books of history?
If my heir and I withdraw from Iraq without victory...

by sheriffgali

Author's Comments:
"Many books were written about our 41st President. In 2002, I condensed his life from 1981 as Vice President to the present day. Poetry can be very revealing.[A FANATIC IS ONE WHO CAN'T CHANGE HIS MIND AND WON'T CHANGE THE SUBJECT. Sir. Winston S. Churchill] It is very important for people to know that I am not attempting to be despiteous to a family of 'pedigree' and 'appanage', for I wish that that was the case. But it is far more serious than that. For me poetry is the expression of one's feelings, in some cases fiction and in others, like this one, facts, actual facts. So please take this four part journey with me and see how far down the road of perdition we are, due to "malapropos" [a deceitful means to a deceitful end], egregious, pernicious machinations from the people we empower. To the readers of this four part journey ,some who are not so informed, it may go over their heads, then again, there would be those who are well informed, but it will anger them because the truth hurts, then there would be the third group, the ones Shakespeare spoke to; 'To Thine ownself be true, and it must follow as the night the day, thou then canst be false to anyman.' To this group, this four part series would be like lightning in the mid-night sky. Lord help us all. This was written at the end of 2002."