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Mary Hodgson

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Balloons, Bananas and Collateral Damage

Those bombs which blasted houses
killing civilians, women and children,
were of course a mistake.
They had slanted off-line from target –
unfortunate collateral damage.
Those responsible said they were sorry.

Iraqi children watched the clowns,
silent, unsmiling for a while,
then, intrigued by unfamiliar antics
and silly walks, broke into laughter.
They loved the colourful attire, the slapstick
and bendy balloons twisted to animal shapes.
Mothers heard them laughing
for the first time in months.

I think back forty years.
You seemed radiant with life,
dark eyes sparkling fun as you
sprayed the garden hose
over your kids and mine
in the plastic paddling pool.
I thought you settled and happy
though you had your oddities –
wouldn’t let your children eat bananas
until the skins were black and floppy;
they weren’t digestible till then, you said.

You wouldn’t read your children fairy tales.
You said they bred illusions, and you knew too well
no fairy godmother could wave a wand
to help the helpless. Cinderella stories,
princes and beggar-maids were anathema;
it’s wrong to instil ideas of class division
from baby days, you said.

You knew you had been lucky, sent to safety here
by grieving, loving parents, yet even so
were haunted still by ghosts of holocausts
and all your kindred gone.
Later you slit your wrists in a warm bath.

I listen to world news. Today it’s spring,
but I see no burgeoning of an earth
free from collateral damage.

 

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