The Casualties by J.P. Clark

The casualties are not only those who are dead .
They are well out of it .
The casualties are not only those who are dead .
Though they await burial by installment.
The casualties are not only those who are lost
Persons or property, hard as it is
To grope for a touch that some
May not know is not there.
The casualties are not only those led away by night.
The cell is a cruel place , sometimes a haven .
No where as absolute as the grave .
The casualties are not only those who started
A fire and now cannot put out. Thousands
Are are burning that have no say in the matter .
The casualties are not only those who are escaping.
The shattered shall become prisoners in
A fortress of falling walls

The casualties are many , and a good member as well
Outside the scenes of ravage and wreck ;
They are the emissaries of rift ,
So smug in smoke -rooms they haunt abroad ,
They do not see the funeral piles
At home eating up the forests .
They are wandering minstrels who, beating on
The drums of the human heart, draw the world
Into a dance with rites it does not know .

The drums overwhelm the guns…
Caught in the clash of counter claims and charges
When not in the niche others left,
We fall .
All casualties of the war.
Because we cannot hear each other speak .
Because eyes have ceased the face from the crowd .
Because whether we know or
Do not the extent of wrongs on all sides ,
We are characters now other than before
The war began, the stay- at - home unsettled

By taxes and rumours, the looters for office
And wares, fearful everyday the owners may return .
We are all casualties,
All sagging as are
The cases celebrated for kwashiorkor .
The unforseen camp - follower of not just our war .

J.P. Clark

John Pepper Clark-Bekederemo was born on 6th April,1935. He is a Nigerian poet and playwright. He has written and published numerous poems and plays, some of his most popular works are Abiku (poetry) and Song of a Goat (a play).