If Only
the red ran ...
trickled slowly from mouth's
corner down to where it
disappeared beneath the collar of
the little boy's SpongeBob
t-shirt -
bleached white turning crimson ...
the streak wound
its bloody path across cooling
cappuccino skin, a tender
surface that only
moments earlier was aglow with
the salty sweat of play -
tingling with the soft breath
of afternoon ...
the doctor watched
another rill of blood run south
on the child's neck as he
cradled the wee, limp body in his arms
and thought, (in irony), how its
weaving traces reminded
him of the soft, gentle sweep of a
cob swan's wake ...
the early-morn pattern left
in the glassy surface of the lake
where he once lived
as a lad ...
where this beautiful, broken
child might have been -
should have been, certainly - were it
not for the chances of birth
and the horrid, senseless
accursed hand ...
of war.
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