Defenseless

I thought I'd seen it all .... after I got home from the war.

A medic then, but now I am .... the county coroner.

I like my job although I can't explain exactly why.

I guess .... you just get used to knowing people have to die.

I guess to die, is not enough within this modern age.

They want to know the reason, to record it on a page.

So, that's the job that's up to me, when people have expired.

I have to find the "cause of death" that's why I have been hired.

Daily it becomes routine, as I go through my pace.

I rarely even notice, that the body has a face.

I lift the sheet and go to work, to see what I can find.

And usually the person there, has just run out of time.

One thing that used to bother me, I think more than the rest,

Was younger people who had died, by accidental death.

They had their lives... ahead of them, the world was theirs to take,

And now their lives had been snuffed out, because of one mistake.

But, then one day I realized I hadn't seen it all.

When .... they wheeled a gurney in, that had been in the hall.

I looked up ..... from where I was, and saw a little sheet,

And underneath I knew the body had to be petite.

A child I said, and underneath my breath I know I cursed,

I hate to see the young ones here, but children are the worst.

A little one, who doesn't even know what life's about.

Who probably had a disease from birth with out a doubt.

I can almost always tell, when I take my first glance,

The sickness that would not allow, the little ones a chance.

I stopped what I was doing, just to go and take a peak,

Then ....what I found so shocked me that I felt my knees go weak.

A little boy of two or three, with bruises on his face,

And... as I pulled the cover down, saw bruises every place.

His little hands were blistered, with some bums from something round,

His wrist were cut and blistered, looking like he had been bound.

I started feeling sick and weak, as I leaned on the cart,

But, then it changed to raging mad, as I reached for the chart.

"Child abuse at father's hands" was what the ticket said.

Possibility of death, "severe blows to the head".

How on earth is this allowed? I thought I'd seen it all.

How can somebody beat to death, a child that is so small?

I'd read about the child abuse, but did not understand,

But, now I fully realize I've seen it here first hand.

It makes me sick to realize, that child abuse is real.

I know that there are many, who have known just how I feel.

That is why today, for child abuse I join their fights.

Because I know that even little three year olds have rights.

Author Unknown

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