Objector

In line at lunch I cross my fork and spoon

to ward off complicity—the ordered life

our leaders have offered us. Thin as a knife,

our chance to live depends on such a sign

while others talk and The Pentagon from the moon

is bouncing exact commands: "Forget your faith;

be ready for whatever it takes to win: we face

annihilation unless all citizens get in line."

I bow and cross my fork and spoon: somewhere

other citizens more fearfully bow

in a place terrorized by their kind of oppressive state.

Our signs both mean, "You hostages over there

will never be slaughtered by my act." Our vows

cross: never to kill and call it fate.