soldiers desensitized
prisoners dehumanized
images that burn in your eyes
it seems like a crime to breathe this air
this air that weighs so heavily
upon our minds
trees old enough to have seen
the sins of mankind
unspoken words hang above us
as we stand under the gallows
and echoes of
"what if that had been us?"
and the chimney
dwarfing the cross

but purple lilies grow here now