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A wound that refuses to heal
by Tarek Hassan
Wednesday, November 26, 2003
Sharing with my many lovely American friends a journey that carries with it a pain that defies resolution
9.11 and 11.22
In Memory of November 22nd, 1963
This day 40 years ago
My heart received a stab that
just refuses to heal
11.22 on the huge red bus
from West
London
we heard the awful news
a group of friends returning
home
in the thickening London fog
got together every week to
play music, learn and spread peace and joy
Incredulous, numbed,
we tried in vain to shift gears from Mozart to Dallas,
We tried
in vain to take in the news of the assassination
How did it
happen? how COULD it happen?
the wise man said: “weep not,
all wounds that don’t kill you, heal with time”
“Some leave
scars but they will all heal”
yet this wound bleeds on and
on
it’s a wound that refuses to heal
it grows deeper with
time
the questions more insistent
the wound has grown deeper
through thousands of pages of reports, investigations, official
denials, accounts, documentaries, Warren commissions, forensic
experts and final words that resolved nothing at all
The
pain continues to gnaw at the heart for 40 years and more
Nay
for 40 centuries, nay for all history
it is even worse than the
pain, affront and hurt of 9.11
Who killed JFK how and why?
Who killed RK how and why?
Who killed MLK how and why?
Who is killing the known and unknown lads and lasses so full of
hope? how and why?
Who lurks in the wings to pounce ruthlessly
on any bud growing to answer the pain of our infinite longing?
Yet we all forge ahead blithely
dancing to the same
fatuous tunes
In absolute certainty of our perfect rectitude
the why and how and what are forgotten
as we surrender
Without bothering to ask, like Hamlet:
“to be or not to be?”
where is the path?
There is something terribly wrong with the
state
of Denmark?
or perhaps with us?
Copyright
Tarek Ali Hassan
November22nd,2003
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