Drones

I’m reminded now and then of a list of names I read last year. They were the names of children killed by unmanned aerial drones. American drones. I forced myself to read every name. I’m reminded now and then when I see kids playing in a park, or walking through town with their families. If this was Yemen or Pakistan, they could be dismembered at any moment by something from the skies. Their arms and legs, still growing, could be scattered like sticks in a storm. Snapped. Tossed.

I’m reminded now and then of the way I felt when John McCain lost the election. Thank God, I thought, no more warmongers in charge. It was a bright day for acolytes of peace. So we thought. The slaughter of children is something against which a human conscience hurls itself desperately. The subject of the slaughter of children, however, is something from which a human intellect retreats with a fearful passion. I’m reminded of the fire with which acolytes of peace railed against Rumsfeld, Cheaney and Bush. We could use a little of that fire now.

 My family and my co-workers think any talk about this subject is the raving of lunatics. Keep our shores safe, support the lesser evil, vote and vote and vote and vote they say. Someone needs to stand up for those kids. Someone needs to demand accountability and justice. Someone braver than I am; I’m reminded now and then, but that’s where it stops.