Now we’re on the border
heading for Nineveh
for the Christians trapped by Daesh scum
tranquillisers are no good for what is to come,
nor are religious beliefs of any sort.
divert your mind, the manuals say,
love the space
enter the tranquillity of bees,
I know about my weapon
I service my Tabuk Sniper Rifle 
people appeal to me to kill
the murderers of their children, the rapists of Yezedi girls,
the scum 

Speed is now slowed to a drone; to a quill
moving over a paper desert
a quintessence of thrill
awaiting these bastards
drones are only minutes from take-off
over the ridge, the spotters say,
our guns in place  will do the job.

Nothing impresses like force,
Nineveh was once the high knot of Christendom,
flinging stars at the stone kingdoms of the night.
festooned now with these fucking black flags of brutality,
and me, here, all alone: the only Gypsy in the troop.

The seventh son of a seventh son,
the prophet of a prophet,
the Twelver of antiquity.
alive, only for this moment,
to kill these Salafist devils
helped along by the Yezedi
women's protection units.
 

Within this veiled prison of heat,
stripped of all emblems of identity:
no DNA to be extracted from my
hair, nails, name, toes, feet:

I am made anonymous
I am a volunteer,
my comrades may explode into thin air,
temporarily bleed into the sand
but we will still stand like
the monuments of Nineveh
and fight....