"If This is a Man" by Primo Levi

     You who live safe
     In your warm houses,
     You who find, returning in the evening,
     Hot food and friendly faces:

     Consider if this is a man
     Who works in the mud,
     Who does not know peace,
     Who fights for a scrap of bread,
     Who dies because of a yes or a no.
     Consider if this is a woman
     Without hair and without name,
     With no more strength to remember,
     Her eyes empty and her womb cold
     Like a frog in winter.

     Meditate that this came about:
     I command these words to you.
     Carve them in your hearts
     At home, in the street,
     Going to bed, rising;
     Repeat them to your children.

     Or may your house fall apart,
     May illness impede you,
     May your children turn their faces from you.

"Battleships" by A. Monaghan

We were lying on our stomachs face to face
playing a game of battleships.

It was America versus the Japs, he was America
and I was the Japs (as always when it came to the
Pacific campaign).

As I went to place a dud,
white peg on my attack radar board,
he asked, "How did you get those purple scars
on your arms dad, was it in a war?"

He's past seven years old now, a tricky age.
I had read in a parenting book, that at this
age with boys, honesty was always the best
road to go down. I decided to be honest.

"I did those scars myself, when I was crazy
and sad. You where very young then," I explained.

"How?" he asked.

"Well, you know that sharp sharp knife that you
aren't allowed to use unless a grown up is helping
you? Well that's how."

"Why? he asked.

"Because I was crazy and sad at the time. I cut myself
to stop being crazy and sad."

"Do all grown ups make scars, will I make scars?" he asked.

"I don't know." I replied. "Maybe other grown ups do other things
when they are crazy and sad, but I don't think you will do it."

"Did it hurt dad?" he asked.

"No, not at the time, but it did hurt later," I replied.

"Does it still hurt?" he asked.

"Yep, but in a different way than when I actually cut myself, it hurts
more inside than outside," I tried to explain.

"Can I kiss it better, like when you kiss it better when I hurt
myself playing?" he asked.

"Sure thing," I replied. "That would help."

As he leaned over the two opposing battleship boards,
he took a long good look at my fleet.

He kissed the dark red scar on my bi-cep and returned to his side
of the game.

Two moves later he sank my destroyer!

Kids are much sharper than we give them credit for...he won the game.