by Nick Gisburne
Too shattered by her screaming to resist,
Her palsied, panting victim kneels, to die,
Ashamed to show his raw, infected wrist,
The blistered brand, the blazing butterfly.
She spits upon her prisoner, her pet.
No scrapper from the battlefield is he.
His value she will not consider, yet,
Until she plucks his final, fading plea.
He begs, as thousands, dying, always do,
But not enough to clarify his worth.
No evidence his blood was ever blue.
Impossible to certify his birth.
Disgusted at his presence in this place,
She brands a mark of death upon his face.
