Diversity

It doesn't matter how you paint your skin
or drape sackcloth across your bones
to celebrate an ancestral theme.

It doesn't matter if you foreswear labour
to celebrate ancient script or burn
a scented stick to stimulate the mind.

It doesn't matter if you heed the bells
that call you to communal sacrifice
or if you sleep and dream away a day.

It does matter if your strident horn
to urge the car ahead to go on green
is always at your fingertips.

It does matter if your children don't know
how to search the wild universe
to find the colour of their cloth.

It does matter if the children
can't put words right together
and feel clearly explain they how.

It does matter, it does matter
if the lion is the only predator.
He can't eat everything.