Then Whose For the Bell Ring?
(A Carillon for Peace)
In the tower, tall and still,
the bronze-mouth waits on human will.
No banners fly, no voices sing—
just wind…
and then—
the bell begins to ring.
A single note, cold and clear,
breaks across the stratosphere.
Not thunder’s cry, nor trumpet's call,
but something older, reaching all.
Who does it call? And why today?
To whom does that deep tone convey
its solemn hymn, its rising plea—
a question folded into key?
It tolls for lands where bombs once fell,
for mothers who had none to tell,
for every silence shaped by war,
for what we lost, and what we are.
Each bell, a voice from every shore—
not kings, nor flags, nor calls for more—
but hands that reach through smoke and dust,
that ask again whom now to trust.
A carillon of ache and grace,
it plays upon the human face.
It knows no creed, no chosen few—
it sings for them, and me, and you.
So when it rings, do not deny:
It tolls beneath your very sky.
Not far, not gone, not "them" alone—
the bell is carved from your own bone.
Then whose, you ask, for whom the sound?
It echoes through each battleground—
but deeper still, in softer places,
it moves behind forgotten faces.
It rings for every prayer unspoken,
every treaty left there broken.
For strangers named as enemies,
for dreams that drowned in distant seas.
And still it tolls.
Not just for pain,
but to remind us—try again.
To break the sword, to plant the seed,
to see the human in the need.
Carillon… O wounded song,
you toll because we’ve waited long.
But still we breathe. And breath can build—
a peace not bought, but bravely willed.
So next time when the bell does swing,
don’t ask aloud,
“Then whose for the bell ring?”
Let silence say, let conscience see—
It rings for you. It rings for me.
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