Wrath, The War of July

In this month of July, Mars God of War
Has burnished new weapons of fury galore.
The roads are lost in craters profound
As the offspring of Isaac with science new-found
Assail without pity and in Martian mold
Hurl down destruction a thousandfold.
A State using terror, overwhelming in fire,
Perpetrates murder and massacres dire
On the Creator’s Eden , the true Holy Land ,
Thinking to crush what makes Lebanon grand:
Sixty centuries of science and glory
With the ABC which begins the story.
From Mohkos, Zeno, Euclid, Pythagoras,
Lebanon ’s children, came our science.
Asia , Africa , America , Europe dear child of Tyre ,
They turn against us, holy land of Jesus fair.
Hails of fire and tempests, storms and ‘quakes,
Assaulted from the air each city shakes.
Veritable Cain, violent, angry and murderous,
Turning on brothers wrath vicious and furious.
Bridges cast down and great structures laid low,
Fields lying scorched where crops used to grow,
Smoke reaching the sky made lurid by flame,
With the odor of death where the hell-riders came.
Death makes a feast-day where human bones,
The remains of the martyrs, lie under the stones.
Scenes of horror where nothing is spared
By raging beasts who have not cared
For flesh and blood, in this war they wage,
No help may reach the victims of their rage.
They rain down mass destruction from on high,
For scenes of hell under a blackened sky.
They vaunt the power of their aerial strength,
Sad progress of the West, made to vomit death.
They desecrate the air that should be ours,
Regardless of our prayers to higher Powers.
Land of the Blessed Virgin, of cedars of ancient age!
Sons of Lebanon , brothers dear and children of the sun,
The trap was set with ruse now clear to every one.
Our Lebanon , our love, our spring, our prayer,
Our Lebanon , model of living together,
Our Lebanon , our love and salvation, and worldwide grace.
For the heirs of Abraham, Father of old,
For gaining Jerusalem , the Temple and Ark in its place,
Tables of Law, prophets and what they foretold,
Jacob and Moses and David right down to the Christ,
When God with his creation kept his tryst;
There was before and after, new ‘wakening in trust.
Quarrel no more; Christ’s incarnation
Has wiped out the blood by self-immolation.
We all are brothers whatever our breed,
Equals in law, both freeing and freed.
We are not one caste but mankind universal,
To be united in love and peace eternal.
My way is justice and life and my source the light.
Touch not the tiger asleep in your sight,
Blindly he springs to use his might.
For two of their soldiers seized by our men
They have lost one hundred in hate again.
Attack on attack with fury they mounted
And our loss is too great to be ever counted.
See Cana the town by a miracle blest
When Christ made wine water at Mary’s request.
Southern Beirut has reeled ‘neath the bombs,
And a million have fled to welcoming homes.
They call themselves the people chosen!
But the true elect are those who love and pardon,
We Lebanese! Again and again did that army attack
But our heroes were firm and drove them all back.
The world’s eyes were opened with thunderstruck look,
Must Lebanon always be trod underfoot?
The great Arab giant did nothing but stare,
The West alone can act and show care.
Those calling themselves Arab show they remain
Helpless and hopeless, their titles are vain.
No longer a war-ground may Lebanon be
But a land that’s united, prosperous and free.

Joseph Matar
All rights reserved © LebanonArt
Translated from French: K.J.Mortimer