For Such a Time
by L. Stewart Marsden
Asma, Asma!
who knoweth whether
the centuries together
have brought you to this time?
For long ago
So it is told
Your sister in a legend old
came boldly forth by design
To plead her case
To Xerxes strong,
Unravel nooses strung in wrong
Awaiting to be sprung.
Asma, Asma!
Your Bashar do approach
And dare to reproach
All the killing he has done!
Asma, Asma!
Does the blood not cry
Like old Mordecai
Pleading for respite?
Asma, Asma!
Are you so locked in fear
You no longer hear
The terrors of the night?
You knoweth inside,
You can no longer hide
Or look off to one side
Ignoring what is true . . .
Asma, Asma!
There is another choice –
A clarion voice –
And that voice is you.
Day 21of the National Poetry Month challenge to write a poem a day for thirty days.
Asma al-Assad, wife of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, was born and educated in the United Kingdom, where she earned her BS in computer science and studied French literature. Attractive, well-educated, she is in a unique position to influence her husband for right, much as the Biblical heroine, Esther, was. The question is: will she?
My brother-in-law told me of the following news item re the wives of U.N. diplomats urging Asma al-Assad to intervene in what is occuring in Syria: http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/un-wives-urge-syrian-first-lady-stop-your-husband