Oradour

Never rebuilt to remember.
I can’t but hear
Screaming
As they were burnt alive.
Are we what we do?
Who were they
Those who burnt women and children?
A farmer, a teacher,
A father, a son.
Where they what they did?

As a child, I was told of Oradour
I was also told
Of the man who barked
On the village square
The man who lived
In the dog house.
Was he what he did?
He was a teacher, he was a dissident.
What about those who tortured him
To that state?
Were they what they did?

Today there is a child
Somewhere in this world,
She is sixteen
Dressed in a jacket
Full of explosives
Will she be what she did?
Or should we ask
Why?

Patrice Capitant 2013