The beginning
Life a cruel mistress
Joining fate to cause
Grief to those who
Love by making them hate

Hate becomes an intimate lover
Death the new play thing
Grief their new best friend
As fate cruelly and savagely 
Plays both sides of the board

Both sides are deceived
Both blind to the deceit
Both so blinded by rage
That neither side can see
The end draw near

The end comes in a flash…
Enemies blink out of existence…
It’s over…

But grief and hate survive
Living on in the hearts and minds
Of the players offspring
Breeding and cultivating
Vengeance and revenge

And so life is fated 
To bring with it a myriad of evils
Brewing in silence and gathering strength are
Grief, hate, misery, death, deceit, rage,
Vengeance, revenge, jealousy, envy, betrayal,
Treachery, disloyalty, infidelity, dishonesty,
Corruption, fraudulence, adultery and injustice

Waiting to impregnate the fertile minds
Of our offspring with seeds of destruction
So they may begin the game of life anew

And so begins round two
The new players born with 
Visions of hate and retaliation bubbling
In young hearts knowing no other 
Way to express grief and so they
Hate with a fury that can only
Be expressed in vengeful retribution

Again both sides are
Gripped with a rage that
Hath more fury than 
A woman scorned and
Hold no bounds ‘cause it
Spreads with each new life
That is brought into this world

And thus this vicious cycle
Repeats again and again and again
Each generation born with
More hatred than the last

There is no conceivable end in sight
Though try as we might
We will never quell these feelings
As long as these emotions are allowed
To boil, fester, infest, procreate, 
and Entrench themselves in the young 
and easily Influenced minds of our children 
and our Children’s children

They will only grow more powerful
Seeding themselves in more
Minds as each generation grows larger
Creating the building blocks 
For the next generation
To continue this cruel game 
We all know as
LIFE

***************
The title of this poem is LIFE  because since 
for as far back as life extends the fears and anger 
of our parents are instilled on us and therefore 
travel from one generation to the next regardless 
of race, religion, or lack there of

I wrote This poem after 9/11 as I sat and watched news 
reports of the celebrating men, women and children 
in the middle east, and the mourning of our own people