The Somme (Remove filter)
Walking into light
Morning sun silvered the poplar leaves
Somewhere others lay in the cut clay, waiting
And I smelt the sea’s dead things
As I walked.
Kelp, razor shells, crabs, limpets
We laughed and swam in sandy craters
And I walked
By Goat's Water, the Old Man looked down
As he had for all my life
And all those other lives before
The smell of wet bracken, sphagnum, washed sl...
Sunday 10th November 2024 1:19 pm
Walking into the light
The morning sun silvered the poplar leaves
Somewhere others lay in the cut clay
waiting
And I smelt the sea’s dead things
As I walked.
Kelp, razor shells, crabs, limpets
School friends swam and laughed in sandy craters
And there I was walking
By Goat's Water, the Old Man looking down
As he had for all my life
And all those other lives before
The smell of wet bra...
Thursday 9th November 2023 9:32 pm
Why I went back
Why I went back
A posthumous poem in the voice of Walter Tull – 28.04.1888 to 25.03.1918
Until you’ve been under fire
hunkered down in some funk hole
you’ll never know terror, the horror
or the damage to the soul
that just one barrage can do,
before you ever hear the whistle’s blast
that, sadly it’s true
for all too many,
signals this’ll be your last.
So...
Friday 17th January 2020 6:44 am
Blood Brothers In Arms
Blood Brothers In Arms
My uncle Jack nearly died
in the battle of the Somme.
Crawling from his trench
he was the victim of the bomb
that threw him in the air
and killed his brother, Tom.
Deafened by the blast
and blinded by the mud
he lay upon the battlefield
drowning in his blood,
praying God would save him
as only his God could.
But the gods ...
Friday 19th October 2018 1:48 pm
Snow and Lightning
A while ago, I was reminded by my brother that our grandfather had fought in the Battle of the Somme, on the Western Front in 1916, where he was wounded and evacuated back home. This is for him, and for everyone.
Snow and Lightning
When winter paints the churned land white,
and splintered trees hang like sentinel flames,
snowfall that dusts bloody parapet stains
hardens to a sa...
Sunday 22nd January 2017 7:35 am
A Summer Morning
One summer Morning
Came them the young boys in their thousands
One summer morning just like this
Reaching out for a mother’s kiss
The sturdy arm of a father
Came then the bullets and splintering shell
Mud and blood and ripping wire
Into smoke black and buggered hell
They’re still there in the fields beneath the flowers
In their thousands where they fell
In ...
Friday 1st July 2016 2:38 pm
To Remain
Look, I like having legal rights; to be a citizen not just a subject,
but I’m not without doubts about this great European project.
No, I don’t fear drowning in seas of asylum seekers some’d prefer out of my backyard
but the far right’s rise darkens my night skies and I find some truths really are quite hard.
Yes, the status quo is twisted so some not so nice people do too well off it,
b...
Wednesday 1st June 2016 11:48 pm
Grandchildren Of The Somme
Grandchildren Of The Somme
the dead lay on the injured earth
all wearing grey death masks of mud
a tally of what life is worth
just bone and sinew flesh and blood
attrition wrought its deadly cost
the river Somme held back its flood
humanity forever lost
just bone and sinew flesh and blood
sixteen miles wide and just six deep
survivors wondered if they could
block out the dreams t...
Saturday 19th April 2014 3:38 pm
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