Help!

Help’s easy enough If it comes in time. Nothing’s that hard If you want to rhyme.

It’s when they shoot you It can hurt, When the bombs blast off And you’re gone with a squirt.

Sitting in a bunker, Feeling blue? Don’t be a loser, It wasn’t you–

Wasn’t you wanted To go kill people, Wasn’t you caused All this trouble.

I can’t say, Run! And I can’t say, Hide! But I still feel What I feel inside.

It’s wrong to kill people Just to make them pay. Wrong to blast cities To make them go away.

You can’t take everything Away from fathers, Mothers, babies, Sisters and brothers.

You live in a house? Wipe your feet! Take a look around– Ain’t it neat

To come home at night And have a home, Be able to sit down Even all alone?

You think that anyone Ought to get pushed, Shoved around for some old Bush?

Use your head, Don’t get scared, Stand up straight, Show what you’re made of.

America’s heaven, Let’s keep it that way Which means not killing, Not running scared,

Not being a creep, Not wanting to get “them.” Take a chance And see what they want then.

Maybe just to be safe, Maybe just to go home, Maybe just to live Not scared to the bone,

Not dumped on by world They won’t let you into, Not forgotten by all The ones who did it to you.

Sing together! Make sure it’s loud! One’s always one, But the world’s a crowd

Of people, people, All familiar. Take a look! At least it won’t kill you.

ROBERT CREELEY is one of the nation’s most acclaimed poets. He is the Samuel P. Capen Professor of poetry and humanities at the State University of New York, Buffalo. His most recent book of poems is Life and Death.