My Prayer for the Bulldozers

May the sun-stained anchor of your body
find peace in the dusk

Engines idled and blades lowered

may you turn gnarled wings back into yourself

as a cease fire from the dust storm

as a pressed crane offering of hope that
somewhere there is purpose in your golden wings.

We have watched you caterpillar yourself
innocently yellow across this land

But I see the razed houses in your irises

the shaken tears of civilians on your cheeks.

I know your drivers will say

“we were just doing what we were told”

when foaming mouth roaring into the city you
snapped bloodlines, displaced humans

from necessary shelter.

I know a woman whose house
was wiped away by your blades.

Two days later, she was handed an invoice

for the parts, time, labor
for the very maize monster

that made her a homeless statistic.

How do we explain what you’ve turned into?

How you have become annihilator instead of farmer?

You were meant for so much more than excavation,

than intimidation or destruction.

You have the tools to till this land,

make it ripe for blooming

To move dirt into hungry mouth craters,

Build hills from which we can once again
feel the breeze or watch our children grow.

So my prayer for you is this

The time is now to end the demolition

Stop tractoring yourself over any hopes of peace

Come down from your cockpit and join

us at the table

Learn to use your words.