My Only Cry
by Leila Ibrahim Semaan
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Subtitled 'Close the Arms Factories', this poem is a child's passionate appeal for peace, addressed to the grown-ups of the world who keep building deadly weapons. The child speaks for all the children of the world, saying that they cannot rebuild what the adults destroy, and that a better world cannot be built without the adults. Because the world is 'deaf', the children's cries seem useless. The child says the time for talk of friendship, peace and fellowship is over, enough promises, enough waiting, and calls on everyone to ask the makers of arms to stop making weapons, to stop making wars break out, and to stop telling lies. Both children and adults are 'sick', yet the children still ask the arms-makers to 'close your arms factories and think about taming the winds'. Right-wing and left-wing politics mean little to the children, for their life is 'essentially affection', but through the fault of the adults, 'a veil of dust' (the dust of gunpowder and war) lies over it. Written in blank verse, the poem is a heartfelt protest against the arms race and a plea to make the world safe for children.
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The child's helpless appeal
The child, still a child who does not know how to lie like grown-ups, addresses the adults of the world. All the children of the world together could not rebuild what the adults destroy, and a better world cannot be rebuilt without the adults. The child says their cries are useless in a 'deaf world', and that words like friendship, peace and fellowship should be spoken, and meant, by the adults themselves.
Enough promises and lies
Tired of empty promises and endless waiting, the child calls on everyone to ask the arms-makers to stop making weapons, to stop making wars break out, and to stop telling lies. The child admits that both the children and the adults are 'sick', yet insists 'we are here'. In everyone's name, the children ask the arms-makers: 'Close your arms factories and think about taming the winds', that is, control destruction and use nature's forces for good.
Life is affection under a veil of dust
Right-wing politics and left-wing politics matter little to the children, because they are only children. Their life is 'essentially affection', love and care, but through the fault of the adults 'a veil of dust' lies over it: the dust of gunpowder, weapons and war that hides and threatens their loving world. Written in blank verse, the poem is a strong protest against the making of destructive weapons and a plea to keep the world safe and loving for children.