June 28, 1914: Archduke Ferdinand slumps back
in the rear of the car motoring through Sarajevo.
Warm red sap oozes out as life escapes him
and catapults fury throughout the empire.
Global War I

November 11, 1918: The rat-tat-tat of the machine gun
finally silences after four years of halting attackers.
The losing power soon to be crippled by the pile
of red tape burying any recovery.
Collapse

October 29, 1929: A Dark Tuesday sweeps over Wall Street
the tickers plummeting with the rapid succession of growing red arrows.
The dignity and stability of a rising working nation
reduced to the labor of building bridges and tunnels.
Poverty

May 9, 1934: A dull red dust storm ravages across the country
reducing the manicured upright rows to shrivels.
The wealth of the land smothered leaving the plots to wither away
as the residents of the one story brick house pack for the city.
Hunger

December 7, 1941: Land of the Rising Sun planes
splotched with red circles on their wings release bombs into the harbor.
Scarred bodies float in the water and broken ships come to rest as news spreads
and freedom puts blocks the front of oppression.
Global War II

November 3, 1943: Auschwitz bleeds out skinny jews labeled with numbers
whose false crimes forever link them to the red flag that once flew above.
Many become isolated left with nothing but a shell of their former self
yet the false shower never sprayed death on them.
Tyranny

June 7, 1954: Alan Turing takes a bite
out of his red apple like always before going to rest.
Yet, he fails to rise with
the sun as the cloak of the darkness lifts.
Cyanide.