Cotton Ball Clouds
Coursing through the sky like fish in a stream
Springtime fields of poppy
swaying to the earth's omnipresent music

Dad and daughter laughing and playing
he lifts her up so she can fly
as they enjoy their picnic of fun

Brothers flying flags of azure and gold
passing old stories and a glinting flask
teasing and reminiscing

the grizzled fisherman wading in the river
rubbing his lucky blue hat
thoughts of cooking fish with his wife on his mind

lovers embraced in a circlet of poppy
eyes closed imagining, planning out the
future with a house, a baby

MIGs tear across the sky
decimating the clouds
erupting the land below in fire

Soldiers stomping on poppies
Bullets screaming
From the mouths of their trigger happy fingers

Poppy petals pooling in blood
The dad clutching the still hand of his little girl

Knives rising and falling, cutting up lives
The cut free kites flying towards the heavens

Blood is thicker than water
As it flows with a bobbing blue hat

Fists locked in combat
like the frayed ends of the clasped lover's hands

A mother making dinner for her
Husband and daughter to come cheerfully home to
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A mother and father kitting and reading the newspaper
waiting for their boys to barge through the front doors
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A recently widowed wife watching the news
realizing her husband was fishing in the area of the battle
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A love never fulfilled
destroyed by the fires of war
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I no longer want
to be in a world that chooses war over love
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