Taking a breath
Atoms are engulfed by my body.
Atoms of carbon that formed the scales of dinosaurs
Freed by the extinction of the monstrous lizards.
One atom was part of Caligula's right hand
The hand that ordered executions on a whim
Freed by the assasins who liberated Rome.
That molecule of water formed part of whiskey once;
Whiskey that intoxicated the natives of America
Freed when they were murdered in their drunken sleep.
Particles of ash from the Nazi death camps
Freed when the Jews were incinerated like rags.
One solitary iodine
A remnant of Chernobyl
Freed when the reactor split.
A fleck of gunpowder from Bosnia
Freed when a sniper shot a mother going for water.
Where am I that I take al this in one gulp of air?
Some museum of cruelty, a library of bloody acts?
No.
It's just an ordinary sigh
As are made every day
By everyone.
Re-absorbing their history
Simply by respiring.
And it cannot be avoided
Our lives leave traces for ever.
My reflection over; I take a deep breath,
Deeper for the knowledge of it's contents,
(The sinking of the Titanic or the mutiny on the Bounty?)
And move on to create my own, small, traces.