Skip to main content

Kosovo Polje

Who stood at Kosovo Polje?
Who heard the guns at Waterloo?
who remembers those days today,
to bear the rancour this day too?

The time we were meant to forget,
the writer's pen traps it in ink.
We read much but we do not think,
and contrived hatred we beget.

None lives who saw the mad work done.
But mention an imagined past,
None hesitate to pick a gun
And swear to defend to the last.

The last who remember are dead
We rush to take their place instead.

Published in Remember, ed. Paragram; Four Point Press, Shepperton, 2014. ISBN: 978-0-9927123-2-7.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

She's complicated

She's complicated. She'll charm you with charts, statistics and that corporate smile. But look into those eyes, they're fiercely bohemian. She's complicated. Her chatterings seem to resonate with happy sounds, but listen with the other ear, to an unhidden lament. She's complicated. Her silences agonise, her voice echoes in her absence. And yet there is a mild dread as her name flashes on the ringing phone. She's complicated. Sometimes she's a poetess, shallow, romantic, trying to hide a sardonic, world-weary wit. She's complicated. She could be a spiteful Fury, wrath unabated, but that's just to hide the lamb-hugging girl within. She's complicated. She's an enchantress, a fool, a tyrant, a nurse, an imp, a priestess, but she's generally a good friend. She's complicated. Published in Making Waves - A Poetry Anthology , ed. Pam & Bill Swyers; Swyers Publishing 2011. ISBN: 978-0-9843113-6-1.
8 comments
Read more

The Cruel Love Form Either Meaning Tears Sestina

They ask me to write poems on love. They ask me not to make it cruel. But it should not be funny either. It must follow some poetic form. It must be rich and deep with meaning. It should move people, but not to tears. Why should it not move people to tears? Because they cry when they fall in love For no reason and without meaning. That's because love itself is cruel and causes grief in its every form. One cannot escape from it either. It is not even funny either. One spends all one's time shedding tears And meditating upon the form Of whatever being is one's love Who is in general very cruel And will get upset without meaning. One wastes one's time looking for meaning. One never finds it. One will either die frustrated or suffer cruel punishments. But no one spares tears for stupid people who fall in love And think it is divine in some form. It is not divine in any form. It is senseless, devoid of meaning. the rational do not fall in love They do not play with venom eit...
Post a Comment
Read more

Nellie, 1983

Very often the sun rises in warm, golden rays on opening buds, birdsong and dewdrops, and the stench of stale death. Very often the sun rises Upon mutilated men - blood drying over their eyes and gore-caked machetes rusting in their abdomens. Very often the sun rises over hyaenas fretting over the carrion going waste - they can eat no more, nor can the vultures. Very often the sun rises on a day already defeated - shrieking, screeching, screaming, demanding that it go back for there was peace in the night. Published in Tranquil Muse 2018.
4 comments
Read more