Midweek Review
She can’t go Home again
By Lynn Ockersz
A study of perfect composure seems she,
The WPC hardly out of her early twenties,
Standing alongside battle-ready colleagues,
At spiked, high-rise barricades meant to kill,
Dividing her from slighted youngsters,
Of the same age and social standing,
Appealing for Bread and life’s openings,
But her fingers are slightly a-tremble,
As she steadies her baton with some fidgeting,
For, there’s a lump that’s rising in her throat,
As she remembers her run-down home,
And her skeletal kid sister and brother,
Wilting in villages glossed over by the Census,
Leveling at her this disquieting question:
‘Could you ever be at ease in your Home again,
Once you wield that baton on your suffering kindred?’