No Speaking Out

No political speeches were allowed

on Auschwitz Memorial Day

but even eighty years on

screams can still be heard there.

Listen carefully if you can

and you’ll hear words

amongst the cries

from Gaza 

now.

United Nations

It was set up in the aftermath of war

to enable co-operation 

to warn of catastrophe

to enable peace to be kept

and genocide to be part only of history.

Now it is condemned by its creators,

has become a pariah to those same states

who wrote its charter and envisaged its role

in speaking out 

against oppressors

speaking out

against atrocities.

Still it speaks out

to its creators

who now feed the flames 

of genocide

unitedly deaf and blind.