Suicide Missions

This picture is from Dennis Holmes Designs
 www.illustrationsof.com

Humans send young men to war.
Termites send old ladies.

Too old

to forage for their colonies
they provide one final service—

sacrificing themselves,

breaking apart their bodies,
creating a toxic goo

that seals the tunnels

that lead to the nest,
that kills the predators.

With their abdominal walls broken,

the defenders die.
 

Old men start the wars, but it is young men (and these days, young women) who must fight and die.  I always thought we should send the old men to war.  There might be fewer wars if we did.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

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