Konstantinos Konstantinidis – Amphiktyon
War for the people is evil,
for the warmonger profitable,
painful for the slain and mournful,
and for the environment disastrous.
Like little boats the markets rise and fall,
tankers sink and sailors die.
All products grow expensive,
fuel burns and scorches,
and food flies to the heights of price.
No one asks the people
before a war begins.
Yet the people are sent to fight
while the leader celebrates victory.
When war begins,
the first victim is the environment.
All care for it disappears;
war devours it,
pollutes it heavily, bombs it and sinks it.
Every pollution is celebrated as a victory,
every flattened city praised as a trophy.
Thousands of people are killed,
others wounded,
and even more are driven from their homes.
Military losses are never announced;
civilian losses are called “collateral”.
Buried beneath the ruins,
how can the defeated react?
Yet the human soul remains the strongest weapon.
Whoever kills ants
feels no remorse;
so too their conscience
has long since died.
Human population in excess,
food and energy in shortage.
Our humble poultry breeders,
when the feed runs out,
send some birds to the slaughterhouse.
The powerful of the earth do the same
upon the battlefields,
without shame
and with cold composure.
We say we have become civilized
and have abandoned human sacrifice.
The difference from the ancients is only quantitative:
they sacrificed a single chosen soul,
while we sacrifice millions
with “smart” munitions
and mighty fortresses.
Markets speculate in war,
weapons multiply
and people suffer.
War, and the market dizzy,
rises and falls in confusion.
The chosen of Ares are the winners;
the many of Peace are the losers.
The common folk will pay the cost,
taxes will bleed them dry.
Like subjects they will toil and suffer
just to give their daily bread
to their children.
And those who survived the war,
ruined yet alive and healthy,
with time and patience will rebuild.
But whoever has been killed
no one will raise again.
Tell me, criminal leaders,
how do you sleep so peacefully?
Do you not fear the Furies?
And if you ignore the court of the earth,
before the Supreme Judge
with lies how will you defend yourselves?
Kill, kill—whoever endures.
The slain themselves will judge you.
Beware only of the photographs;
like silent Furies
they will wait.
One day they will judge you.
And if you escape in life,
they will find you
in the Hereafter.
(13/3/2026)
Amphiktyon – Major General (ret.) Konstantinos Konstantinidis
Writer, Member of the Greek Writers Society
http://www.amphiktyon.blogspot.com
amphiktyon.org