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Tuesday, January 14, 2014

KALASHNIKOVS

by B.Z. Niditch


MIKHAIL Kalashnikov, designer of the AK-47 rifle, told the head of the Russian Orthodox Church before his death that he felt guilty for those it killed. -- news.com.au


The arms trade
profits at the world's
children's expense,
who merely ask for love
or just a chance at living
now with no arms or legs
begging for food,
body parts now seen
on technicolor screens
with scars on skin
that cannot be erased
or some without remains
only the memory
of historical or geographical
error of being existentially
at the wrong place or time.


B.Z. Niditch is a poet, playwright, fiction writer and teacher. His work is widely published in journals and magazines throughout the world, including: Columbia: A Magazine of Poetry and Art; The Literary Review; Denver Quarterly; Hawaii Review; Le Guepard (France); Kadmos (France); Prism International; Jejune (Czech Republic); Leopold Bloom (Budapest);  Antioch Review; and Prairie Schooner.  He lives in Brookline, Massachusetts.