The Road Not Taken Then

a poem by Roger B Rueda

We have lived on busy and quiet roads, which
from here to there have gone
through some beautiful countryside,
some as ugly as sin, blades of grass
growing up against the edges of the roads
or the grass is just coming into leaf—
Some time ago there were long and bloody
battles and many Filipinos were killed, perhaps as
road kills, we carried the wounded
from the battlefields,  the roads we took decades ago.
Conditions on the roads were often so bad,
and soldiers were on the point of mutinies.
Crowds marched  through the roads carrying
burning effigies of the presidents and flags of the US.
Police arrested several of the demonstrators,
water from their guns was spraying everywhere.
Some were hit in the legs or arms or heads
or bodies by stray bullets. Some buildings
were bombed out.  A lot of civilians were
massacred and buried along  the road.
Whole communities starved to death
during the long drought or flood. People
needed to put a stop to the plunder of rain forests.
Unemployment had fallen again and again.
The land system was crying out for reform.
Terrorists had seized a lot of hostages
and were threatening  to kill  one a day
unless their demands were met. There were
many scams, insurance and fertiliser. The whole
government was riddled with graft, bribery,
and corruption, children learned by observing adults.

Now this is quite unfamiliar road, it’s a bit
confusing.  Eight tourists, held hostage
by the gunman dismissed from his job, died
on the road not taken then.  This is quite a difficult road
for novice trail blazer to run on, it is a rough road,
full of stones and huge holes. The straight road,
perhaps, is nothing but a dirty great blot
on the landscape  though we can drive fast along it.
But it is envisaged by the trail blazer as if we were
in Elysium, so let’s live in a fool's paradise—
Let’s hope we’ll not find ourselves in a slummy back road.