Poetry

From the Corner of Every Street

From the corner of every street
I heard wailing and crying.
From the mouths of the living,
I heard the anguish of incomprehensible loss.

A line of black, linked arm in arm,
Tread softly on Beslan’s bloodstained streets.
They go together
To bury their dead.

How could they have ignored
The light of the world in your eyes,
When they wired their bombs for death?

How could they not realise
That your innocence was their hope,
When the fired their guns as you ran away?

From the corner of every street
I heard wailing and crying.
On the day that Beslan’s children
Went to their rest.

Mark Scott