When we stepped back from the brink – v5

A dark and scary place, painful, awful,
climbing into the heads of our opponents,
our enemies, the Moskals, their evil,
standing with their victims, their prey,
their neighbors, our proxy state, Ukraine,
independent yet caught in the middle,
bleeding, dying, persevering, resilient,
under the onslaught of the aggressor,
aided far too little but just enough…
 
They have no choice but to fight,
I can understand their resistance,
limits on their defensive actions,
they are pawns in this larger battle,
of the superpowers, the warlords,
oligarchs of humanity, of nations,
moving pieces on the chessboard,
acting like they are merely proxies,
expendable, fodder, nothing more…
 
Lies, dirty hands, complicit, pulling,
a half-truth of an unprovoked war,
centuries of battles between them,
a clash of different ideologies,
history, geopolitics, propaganda,
perception become reality, in truth,
choices made between them,
the march ever eastward,
peril its own reward…
 
A drumbeat of history, of genocide,
murmurs of reticence, of appeasement,
denying reality, a hybrid war ongoing,
cities too close to the border,
I hear a gasp of recognition,
how can a lasting peace,
rise in the center of Europe,
fear of NATO on its doorstep,
as anathema to a nation state…
 
Like nuclear weapons in Cuba,
the clash of the heavyweights,
the Cold War never truly ended,
so many decades ago in history,
the same brinksmanship, rhetoric,
the perception our reality, a curse,
they see a knife poised against them,
along miles of border that they share,
a potential loss of imperial lusts….
 
Where are the leaders, the statesmen,
for a light must rise between them,
global enemies and their neighbors,
each plane is important, essential,
a way through the rushing waters,
terror must be brought to heel, genocide,
but we need a corollary this moment,
to when Khrushchev and Kennedy
each stepped back from the brink…
 
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Edited February 17, 2025
When we stepped back from the brink – v5
 
Analog of Ukraine membership in NATO
to Cuban Missile Crisis
Quote attributed to Lee Atwater,
“Perception is reality.”
Quote attributed to Gustave Flaubert
“There is no truth. There is only perception.”
Quote attributed to Aldous Huxley,
“There are things known and there are things unknown,
and in between are the doors of perception.”
Quote attributed to George Monbiot
“What you see is not what others see.
We inhabit parallel worlds of perception,
bounded by our interests and experience.
What is obvious to some is invisible to others.”
&
Edited June 4, 2024
Crying for Crimea – v2
https://raymondafoss.blogspot.com/2024/06/crying-for-crimea-v2.html
Russia’s war of aggression against started with Crimea
in February and March 2014, with the invasion of the green men,
but Crimea is complicated, because the Russian Black Sea Fleet
has been in Sevastopol since 1783…
 
All of my poems, photographs, and videos are copyrighted by Raymond A. Foss, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025. All rights are reserved. Contact me at Ray Foss (raymondafoss@gmail.com)  for usage. See all 53,000+ of my poems at www.raymondafoss.blogspot.com Poetry Where You Live.
 
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Poetry, Ukraine, victory, hope, courage, US, NATO, EU, terror, genocide, peace, Russia, Khrushchev, Kennedy, Cuban Missile Crisis,
 
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