Warriors or Terrorists

Mir Mahboob Ali

If warriors cross borders, they are terrorists!
Attack with tanks and armored vehicles its retaliation!
No matter civilians killed or wounded.
Fighters and bombers demolishing with vengeance
That the civilized designate as defense.
What else could they do, they are so helpless,
Against the degenerate invisible Unknowns.
Look, at the gang of ragtag Ruffians,
Hanging outdated guns from their shoulders,
Have the temerity to call them warriors.
How on earth, they are anything but terrors!
Highly civilized mind fail to comprehend.
Civilized, because, they kill with precision and poise,
Do not blink their eyes, and not bitten by remorse.

So brave determined and resilient are they,

Prepared, armed and trained for a long day.
Not using bayonets, bullets or grenades to kill,
High-flying contraptions do the drill,
With precision, save one or two stray mistakes- what then,
A few women and children are killed, ‘to err is human’.
Thousands of men and women, at a stroke, were lost,
No matter, ten times more lost over decades by one, two and four.
Mindless killings be condemned, in numbers big or small,
In the East or the West, Anywhere and Everywhere.

To defend and demand justice is an inherent right,

Indiscriminate retaliation not proportionate is unjust.
‘Nothing is unfair in love and war’,
Does not give license to kill wholesale.
Wrongs cannot be righted by blunders,
Be in the name of justice or revenge.
Killings of defenseless be condemned,
In the East or the West, Anywhere and Everywhere.

Are not they brave and valiant Crusaders?

Pitted against a band of bandits,
Because, they fight with machine guns,
Toys compared to bombs and missiles.
Warriors and martyrs! How could they be anything but terrorists?
Turbaned, bearded, gun slinging ragged gang of Ruffians.
Warriors are they, who kill with venomous precision,
Stealthily from the sky, causing, unforeseen destruction,
Irrespective of cries for relief and compassion,
In the name of security, humanity, peace and freedom!
Warriors are they, who kill without the slightest remorse,
In the name of truth, justice, equity, sanity and righteousness!