They Want Me to Hate

by Pearl13121984

The anger and sadness I felt while watching news about ISIS and Boko Haram were too much to be silenced. I write this poem to remind myself and hopefully my readers not to hate. Only God love can heal those who are hurt. May the people who had died in the hands of their haters be remembered with love rather than hurt and hate.

They Want Me to Hate

They want me to hate Muslims

They want me to hate Jewish

They want me to hate Christian

They burn Muslims

They shot Jewish people

They beheaded Christians

They who think themselves as heroes against tyranny

They who claim as the protectors of the weak

Kidnap little girls

Strapped bombs to their little bodies

From safe distance push the trigger of death

They wait me to hate

They wait me to snap

And insult other people's faith

And think those different then me as less than me

They wait for me to become like them

To discriminate and to lash

To broad the circles of hate

I am grateful that I am no soldier

For I never want to kill

Yet, if I have a gun

And an ISIS or a Boko Haram stand in front of me

I am not sure that I will not push the trigger

Though Jesus always give forgiveness

Dear Lord

I am thankful that I don't have gun

I am thankful that I am not the one who has to decide

To launch air strike against these haters

I see only a mask

And a voice that demand payment for life of innocents

I do not think I am able

To see a human that You love

Yet I know that You love him

I see killers

Of fathers that can never see their little girls again

Of daughters that can never go home again

Of journalists that can no longer speak for the oppressed

I know that I hate them Dear Lord

And maybe they are half successful

For I already hate them when You command always to love

But I will not hate

My Moslem friends with headscarves

My Jewish friends with Star of David necklaces

My Christian friends with their cross earrings

I will not hate the woman with headscarf that lent me an umbrella during rain

The Jewish man who gives job to my father

The churchgoer that says she will pray for me

I will love

And love and love and love

Though I have no idea God

How to love them who killed while reciting your Name

As if the Almighty need to be defended by sinners

Like them or even like me

Give me strength to love Dear Lord

Not to turn into them