Lynn Ciesielski

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Jesus Didn't Carry A Rifle

Buy in bulk. They're throwaway weapons,
multi-million dollar contract.
And the scopes are scribed with Jesus
so the soldiers blame his words.

They take a downright twisted view
through cloudy smeared up lenses
with their dry and arid conscience
in an empty barren land.

They see cross eyed through the scopes of
a days long gone by prophet.
Their beliefs are sinking faster
like the sucking of the sand.

And he needs some wet refreshment,
a replenishing oasis.
He's longing to be nourished
with the values of his youth.

The scriptures that were coded
on the one way rifle eye-scope
have nearly turned him into
a cynic not a saint.

He points the barrel at his brother,
not an enemy or a bully,
just a human when he sees him
and looks into his eyes.

If he shoots the bullets now
he knows he'll never go to heaven.
The light his scope refers to
casts a shadow on his sin.

There are no verses in the shrapnel,
only sacrilege on Jesus
and in feeding this hypocrisy
we grind our rock to sand.

We shoot scriptures at this jihad
and if words don't penetrate it
we'll stop it with our Jesus rifles,
make them see our way.


Author's note:
You may be familiar with a phenomena that the Muslims and some other non-Christian groups are terming "Jesus Rifles". The U.S. military signed a $600 million multi-year contract with a company called Trijicon. They purchased rifles for use in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Naturally, many people were very concerned by this and implied that we were simply perpetuating a Holy War and likened the situations to the Crusades. Apparently, there was enough flack for Trijicon to end this procedure.


Bio:
Lynn Ciesielski is a recently retired Special Education Teacher. During her eighteen year teaching career she raised her daughter who is now nineteen years old. Now Lynn spends most of her time writing, publishing, performing and traveling. Her poem "Ruling Through Terror" appeared in a June, 2009 edition of Protest Poems.



(author retains copyright)