Ready To Kill - Carl Sandburg

[Larry Robinson]

Ready To Kill

Ten minutes now I have been looking at this.
I have gone by here before and wondered about it.
This is a bronze memorial of a famous general
Riding horseback with a flag and a sword and a revolver 
	on him.
I want to smash the whole thing into a pile of junk to be
	hauled away to the scrap yard. 
I put it straight to you.
After the farmer, the miner, the shop man, the factory
	hand, the fireman and the teamster,
Have all been remembered with bronze memorials,
Shaping them on the job of getting all of us
Something to eat and something to wear,
When they stack a few silhouettes
	Against the sky
	Here in the park,
And show the real huskies that are doing the work of the
	world, and feeding people instead of butchering
	them,
Then maybe I will stand here
And look easy at the general of the army holding a flag
	in the air,
And riding like hell on horseback
Ready to kill anybody that gets in his way,
Ready to run the red blood and slush the bowels of men
	all over the sweet new grass of the prairie.

	- Carl Sandburg