What spectre stalks the daylight’s tender breath,
If not, the hand that dealt living death?
The moon may pale, the night may moan and wane, 
Yet man’s own breast beareth the truest bane.
What fiend is this that smiles in holy guise,
Whose words drip honey, yet whose deeds despise? 
Shall I not fear the fang, but rather trust,
The soul that turns compassion into dust?
In Kashmir’s vale, the saffron weeps unseen,
As blood and prayer mix softly with the green;
The chinars whisper to the sullen breeze;
“How long shall grief grow roots beneath our trees?”
And lo, in Palestine, beneath the broken dome,
The orphan wanders, exiled in his home.
His toy, a stone; his cradle, scorched by flame;
Yet still his eyes hold peace that hath no name.
Say, dost thou hear the mother’s trembling sigh,
As smoke and silence kiss the weeping sky?
What monster feeds upon her lullaby,
And makes her cradle echo with a cry?
Art these the beasts of which old tales were told,
Or men, whose hearts have bartered love for gold? 
What wolf hath ever ravaged so refined, 
As a man who slays his brother in his mind?
O world, dost thou not blush beneath thy fame,
When mercy’s lamp burns low in justice’s name?
Shall law be sword, and faith the sharpen’d chain, 
That binds the meek in everlasting pain?
Behold, how marble thrones on blood are built, 
While poets drown in oceans of their guilt; 
The olive tree bends low with ashen grief, 
It's a fruit forbidden, hope denied relief.
Where walk the gods when mortals feast on dread? 
Do angels turn away their shrouded heads? 
Or weep they too, upon the crimson sand,
Where childhood dies by man’s instructed hand?
What worth hath reason when the heart is slain,
And intellect doth sanctify the chain? 
The wise grow dumb, the brave grow small and cold, 
While tyrants crown themselves with borrowed gold.
Was Eden lost to the serpent’s whispered guile, 
Or to the man who learnt deceit with style? 
For hell’s not deep, nor heaven far above, 
Both dwell within the deeds of those who love.
To every scream that pierces the mountain’s womb,
Becomes a psalm within the silent tomb; 
And rivers, once so pure, now murmur low,
Of saints unblessed, of graves where lilies grow.
Yet midst the ash, a stubborn light remains, 
Of hearts unbow’d beneath unholy chains; 
They rise like dawn o’er wounds the night hath worn, 
And prove that even pain may be reborn.
O Time, thou witness of both crown and scar,
Dost thou not mock what men proclaim they are? 
Thy scroll records not empires, but their crimes, 
Their dust was made rich with the sorrow of all times.
So ask I still, in trembling souls abide,
Where doth humanity hide? 
In the graves of those whose blood baptised the stone? 
Or in the silence that the living call their own?

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