Not to be or R2P,

So what’s the Dilemma?

when doing right

makes economies tremor.

 

When “Never Again”

is reasoned away,

no matter to those

who don’t have a say.

 

The panga and bomb

the fist and the gun,

reign over a song

too often heard sung.

 

The pen and the suit

the fine things of State,

the willing recruit

to the Profits of Hate.

 

The Corpses and Dust

left to rot and to blow,

in the Scales of The Just

like the Chaff that won’t Sow.

 

I visited the town of Račak in Kosovo shortly after the massacre which occurred there in 1999 when Albanians were executed by Serb Police Units. This action as many others in Kosovo heavily influenced the adoption of R2P by The UN General Assembly in 2005. Since that time it has been frequently disregarded, dismissed and manipulated by Council members acting in their own self-interest.

 

 

It is deep inside

at the back of the cave

where warmth never reaches

where the lick of the flame

is extinguished

by shadow

 

Something invisible

guards the black hollow

where eyes lose light

like a brain

behind thin skull

its fragile brilliance cowers and coils

 

It waits

for the unwitting word

that carelessly encroaches

with wickedness and abandon

it protects a lost library of hope

from where things could be rescued

 

Hostage to itself

such thoughts are not to speak

that they might bring light

to reveal the crooked frame

which only ever recoiled

at ideas which might set it free…

 

 

The Sunshine of My Life

was

cancer neath the Surgeon’s Knife

 

The Calm that Lulled My Restless Mind

was

storm cloud of some Other Kind

 

The Pennies on My Shuttered Eyes

are

answers to My Living Whys

 

The Tears that Fall When I am Gone

will

not absolve me of My Wrong

 

The Words I’ve Penned with Flippant Hand

will

shift and drift like Worthless Sand

 

Grieve not the age that slipped through me

grieve

all of time I Shall Not See…

 

When I was young and only knew

of love as pure as morning dew,

I fixed upon a Scottish sky

with clear untainted childish eye…

 

and wondered what might lie beyond

to hold my heart and mind so fond,

that I could leave such sheltered home

and without want so idly roam.

 

Now I am old I’ve come to know

of love that stays wherever I go,

that see’s beyond the earthly veil

where right and all that’s good prevail…

 

and though the shadows dark and long

reach out to me from where I’ve gone,

I stand amidst unfailing light

a man blessed with a child’s sight.

 

 

I am of fighting age

though all I’ve ever done is run

 

They put me in this cushioned cage

and tarred me with what others done

 

I’m the apple of my father’s eye

though here I’m stranger fruit

 

They say that we should leave or die

although they say their Police don’t shoot

 

I am a child alone and scared

though women here have sheltered me

 

They say it’s not for them to care

if all my family died at Sea

 

I am a father bereft of all

though none believe my wretched tongue

 

They say my prayer is Jihad’s call

though I care not for what they have done

 

I am a human frail and lost

marooned among a hail of hate

 

They say my life is worth no cost

As I beg for mercy at their gate

 

I am dependent upon their gift

to treat me as they will

 

That by some grace their hearts they’ll lift

that all our hate should calm and still…

 

 

 

Farhad fucked his Brothers wife

and with that act also his life.

He ran at first to Gulbahar

though Gulbahar was not so far…

 

from where a pledge of bond was made

that honour with their lives be paid,

by those who with their blood were bound

and shared with him dishonoured ground.

 

Wawrina burdened by her fate

succumbed to rocks at Jahannam’s gate.

His brother’s righteous wrath was swift

to pay in full their devout gift.

 

No winners here for love nor lust

what God demands his children must…

now only emptiness expands

when zealous words empowered hands.

 

 

I’ve written a couple of poems recently which seem a little repellent in nature. I did write this initially using the word “Coveted” in place of the profanity, it just didn’t work so I swapped it back. I’m not keen on gratuitous bad language but occasionally it just sits better in the rhythm of things.

 

I had an incident of this occur on a project I was on…initially at the time because the guy who fled was an Afghan driver we had to cancel our missions for the day as we believed him to have been kidnapped by Taliban and consequently a security risk, turned out he was just a bad dude who fatally dishonoured his family.

 

That aside the final two lines could apply to some of the rhetoric currently being banded around on these Isles. I have also been giving that some thought.

 

 

 

Kransky took one in the head

his smile blown from his face,

the olive grove now green and red

Hail, Mary, full of grace.

 

The Warrior Poets pitch their pens

from Gijon, west to Alcazar,

convictions morphed from remember when’s

“El Corazon’s” know who they are

 

The heart and head are in the fight

torn between what gives them life,

The darkness of the coming night

a dagger or a surgeon’s knife?

 

From here, the edge of glooming war

we trudge the path that stretches back,

uncertain what it led here for

or how we judge its aftermath.

 

O’Malley caught a flying drone

his torso split in two,

the wheat fields fertilized with bone

God, forgive, the things we do.