Four Poems by Carolfrances Likins
Reflection • June 20th, 2014
watching the wall
walls built by them
through the middle of us
are not built to protect us from us,
but to protect them
from our coming to realize that
we
are
an
us.
walls between enemies might be shields
but walls
between people and their land,
between people and their water,
between people and their neighbors,
between people and the sunset,
are not meant to be shields
but
swords.
walls make poor shields
if they create more
enemies.
walls meant to divide must
unite us:
this wall
must
fall.
I wrote “Watching the Wall” in 2004 after my first trip to Palestine, in the West Bank. Actually, I the poem started forming itself in my mind while I was there, watching the wall being built by the Israelis in the middle of a boulevard in a Palestinian town. Years later, back at home:
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