Like King Alfred,
Slip into the population.
Throwing off his disguise.
Appearing among his troops.
The flame of liberation burning.
Saddam may be too smart.
The Salah ud-Din of his dreams,
The mythological hero
of Arab/Muslim resistance.
This outcome cannot be dismissed.

Iraq is a colonial artifact.
Brute force sustained
This absurd construction:
Three Ottoman provinces,
Religious and ethnic loyalties.
Saddam's problem? US-backed
Administration rapidly encounter
Warring factions, rediscover his solutions?

Occupation is bloody and unsustainable.
Harassed by snipers and suicide bombers.
What happens after: hurriedly proclaim victory,
Install feeble, doomed government,
Pull out before the whole place
Crashes down around it?
The comparisons with Palestine
Will not be lost on anyone in the Middle East.

Engineered the improbable chimera,
The US claims to be chasing
The marriage of Saddam's secular
Brutality and Al Qaida's global insurrection.
Saddam is found killed. His spirit to inspire
Revolt throughout the Muslim world against
Americans, British and, of course, Israel.
War unwilling to return to its casket, almost certainly.

Himself in serious trouble, Pervez Musharraf,
If he is overthrown by Islamic revolt.
A fundamentalist regime, deeply hostile,
Would possess real nuclear weapons.
Coalition forces fail to swiftly kill Saddam?
He may be too smart to wait, like King Alfred,
Slip into the civilian population, throwing off
His disguise, to keep the flame of liberation burning.

sadiq bey