Month: July 2019

The skeletal remains of the 

last of lives

sightless eyes

stare up at the bleaching

sun, while the grit gilds them.

——————————–

Broken cities dry as the dust

from fallen homes

and human bones

silently cling

to costly crippling pasts.

——————————-

High over the hills stretches 

the storm ridden.

hope hidden

sky, where no bird

borrows air to soar.

—————————-

A few feathers float on the scum

from wasted oil

salted soil

and the silent  swards stare

at swollen sulphur waters.

—————————————

Elephants grazing,

lives stunted,

shot and hunted 

for their white gold

their tusks alone live on.

——————————

The hill girt lakes 

richly sourced

fish coursed

much loved sights

emptied of power and pride. 

——————————–

Once where wildebeest were,

a wondrous sight

a lion’s delight

carcasses crumbling

lost to carbon worship.

Breaking news.

She stood tall 

and they said 

to condemn her 

name,

steal her country

and rights

is not profane

nor racist

nor rude

or violent.

———————

Changing values

creating new

enemies that are 

shadows and 

placing vulnerable

children

in violent

and in abusive 

violating

places while 

——————-

fearing the hammering,

on the thin protecting

firewood, of the furtive forces

and no longer

able to facebook

on others to stand

together.

Confusing of right

and left and wrong

and beating out a pattern

of picking on people

who precede with wisdom,

sagacity and with morale

building byways.

——————–

And they twist and 

break the news

until the new waves

confuse and diffuse

the schedules and

nonplus us.

———————–

Disagreements devolve

as treason and so

the troubled just stand

at the margins

and cry that their equality,

human rights,

and hopes

have expired.

It was Mary Magdalene’s

face that caught my eye,

giggling around the camp fire,

leading the line of dancing laughing

women and men as Jesus and others

sang the rhythm.

Jesus sang their happiness

and threaded through

tender touches of words 

of love and generosity,

taught afresh their humanity.

————————

He sang through the streets, 

as they walked, with grace notes

tuning into the prison of pain,

hearing your song, as though 

he has come

just for 

you.

————————

He sang the country roads

in the darkness of days 

and met the wandering shepherds.

His refrain sought out folk in 

fearful hiding and gave 

them a light to hold –

in their shaking hands and

he gave them their voice –

songs of strength and dignity,

hope and unity, threading them all

with the blessing of belonging

————————–

to him, and he included

them from the                         margins

 as he sang his innocence to Pilate

and his Willingness to his father

to sing the agony of the lash,

the cruel cross until he sang the crystal

Song of Resurrection.

————————-

All around his stereo song has made 

ways through the wilderness 

leading along a narrow and stony

way, in which we stumble as

his baritone ballad

balances our being.

I remember growing up 

and looking up

as he towered over me

cared for me

and loved me

It was not his fault

that he was 

left handed.

Keck handed

the schools said,

as they tied his

hand behind his back

and bade him use

their

right hand.

———————–

The righting,

in front of peers

pleased the principal

but marred his fears,

bright brain

and future.

——————–

He grew into a man

and was ever 

slower and insecure,

and our war born

boy irritated

the hell out

of our war torn Dad.

With tear filled eyes

I felt his pain

in punishments

passed out.

———————–

He left to 

make a go

in the forces,

he learned to 

cook and clean

and radioactive 

waste

grew in 

him,

slew

him

too

soon.

————————

I love him,

I miss him

and his love.

The tears trickled and

she held her head in deep 

darkling dread,

her shrunken self hardly

visible under bloody bindings.

——————–

The stinging pain of the lash

and the blood churning brutality

of her tormentors

tempering hatred with terror.

——————–

‘Why curse me with the courage

to counter them?

Look, I’m just a bag of bones

on which they 

beat, for their pleasure.

Take me, please.’

She whispered while

————————

Her eyes roved round the cell

of the cellar that was hers,

struggling against the spirit

within and heard the voice of

the vampire who had patched

the pitiless, pummelling 

of her loveliness;

“She’ll live – just”.

——————–

The pains striped her and pulsed 

and every sliver of her loathed her life;

and her prayer to die unanswered;

and still they planned to lash

more flesh from her fragile form

and they’ll call it the law for they

are cowards and will not hear,

‘That this is monstrous

and

evil 

and 

so

very

very

WRONG!’