On the Day the Warnings Stop Coming

One day, we will pay the price.

One day, history will hold us
responsible for all the crimes
we allowed to happen
to our fellowman.
One day we will each of us
be called and made to account
for all that our brothers
have suffered.
We would be asked, one by one,
what we did about it.
We will be made to regret
every single death,
every orphan child,
every widow,
every burned down school,
every student that violence
deprived of graduation,
every dream stifled by hunger,
every family torn by war.
We would be made
to feel ashamed, and rightfully,
for all the good things
we could have done
but didn’t do because we were
just too damn comfortable
to lift a finger,
too caught up fighting for
what we were entitled to
that we couldn’t even
be bothered to share.
All the times we were called
to stand united against
an overwhelming evil,
and instead allowed that evil
to divide us completely,
sow terror in our hearts
without resistance and
let fear and hatred that
none of us were born with
to run rampant in our homes
and make us close our doors
on those whose last earthly hope
was our mercy,
make us push their boats
back out to sea.

One day we would
be talking to our children
about the world we live in
and we would feel the weight
of all the ways it could have been
a much softer, kinder place
bearing down on our shoulders
that we could hardly
justify ourselves
to breathe.