I once was burdened

a heavy machine made for death

I was the god that decided

who would loose

far in the distance

~

200 bullets

though some showed the way

not for me

but for where to aim

~

if you understand what I am saying here

you know the burden

even if it is just

imaginary

I have never seen myself as someone who is ambivalent about killing, even when I played the role of a soldier. But that said, when I was in the military, it wasn’t on my mind when in training and later in the field. Now I have stronger feelings about it after years of studying history and through my interest in philosophy. Life is too special and valuable to take it away and should be avoided as much as possible. I feel this really strong now, but the strange thing is that I still have a fascination with military machinery. I think my stance on being a pacifist is something that comes out of my study and my realization of how unnecessary all these wars are. We might be driven like a force of nature, and wars are, in this view, just tornados and volcanic eruptions, but I don’t buy that. We can also do science and build space ships together, so it is possible to work together and even solve our problems peacefully if there is the will.