Haiti

I wrote this poem 2 years ago after seeing a 60 Minutes story about the bodies just lying in the streets. May God bless Haiti.

Haiti

There is no dignity
when you die
poor, ten-thousand
at a time.
Your long dead
bodies lie in the streets
piled a dozen high,
some covered, most bare
to survivors stumbling
trance-like looking
for something resembling
normal. Not normal,
bodies in the streets rotting,
eyes open, staring but not
seeing survivors not
seeing a woman, a child
a mother, a daughter,
human beings
scooped together in death
dumped in a truck,
carted out of the city,
dumped in a hole in the ground,
thousands at a time,
alone -
no mourners, no music
no blessing of the souls.
There is no dignity
when you die
poor, ten-thousand
at a time.

(c) 2010 Jeffrey Seale