How much bloody carnage and rubble
is required to atone for sins of a few?
How many eyes must be gouged
to extract desired justice?
If wronged, is exchanging one eye enough?
What about two eyes for one? Or ten for one?
Is twenty enough?
How about a hundred?
Such revenge might feel like justice,
but it fuels hate’s endless cycle.
Can we exit this interlocked sequence
of oppression and reflexive violence?
Can we struggle toward implementing
a radical, restorative, improbable alternative?
Remember what a crucified carpenter taught
about loving enemies and turning cheeks?
Do such ideals seem impossibly wrong
when gushing anger from our wounds?
Yet, as he stretched on splintery beams
no carpenter would willingly build,
he said, while gushing blood for all our sins,
“Forgive them for they know not what they do.”
(First published on Poetry Soup, 26 Dec. 2023.)
Mark Stucky has degrees in religious studies, pastoral ministry, and communications. After being a pastor, he moved into communications and has been a technical and freelance writer for three decades. During his day job, he documented diverse technology products. In free time, he’s written articles, stories, and poems on a variety of (usually spiritual) topics. He has received over three dozen writing and publication awards. Mark believes in following facts and faith, understanding other perspectives, preserving the earth, protecting the vulnerable, and saving the world (or at least trying to). For more writings, see cinemaspirit.info.