Candle

A night
For lighting candles
Commemoration
Of when nations
Went to war -
Yet still we ask
What for?

All these smug smiles
Parades
Saluting heroes
Just charades
For a mere five thousand
Kilometres from here -
They are dying once again.

But our leaders sing
The same refrain
Of brave soldiers
Of duty
Saving us
With their sacrifices -
Which they did.

But all the battles, wars
We've fought
Have only taught us
How better to kill.
And how to make money
From guns that never stay still.
Trading arms that sever limbs -
Then we sing hymns.

But here
Is an idea

Why not say "cease"?
Talk together, make your peace
Make the stupidity of wars
A noble cause
If it brings about an end.
Give their deaths a meaning
Not an excuse to send
Pathos and syrup.

This could be a chance
To end this dance of death.
To prove what we have learned
About the pointlessness.
To turn and say enough.
To truly commemorate
And make this a date
To remember.

Poem for my Daughter on her 1st Birthday

Where has the time flown?
You're already turning one
And wow! How much you've grown
It feels like you weigh a ton

A whole year since you were born
Since you arrived into our lives
My old life I'd never mourn
My love for you and your sparkle thrives

When you grin it makes me smile
Give a giggle, I can't help but laugh
You're adorable in a fabric pile
Cute when chewing on your giraffe

So here with my poet's art
Is a chance for me to say a
Happy Birthday with all my heart
To my darling, special Freja

Allergy

Eyes bright red
Wish I'd stayed in bed
Instead
Of boarding this dust ridden train
Pollen coursing through my senses
Tricking my brain
Into pretences
Of attack
Down a fighting track
And all the while
I itch and scratch
Swallow a batch
Of pills and smile
That I don't sneeze
Or wheeze
That this 'disease'
Will abate at the end of blooming
That late summer will see
A clear eyed me
At season's close
For allergy

Mockingman

I'll begin by saying that I've never been the biggest fan of Michael Gove. It is obvious that his 'improvements' to UK education are based solely on ideology and a desire for total control rather than what is best for the country as a whole. However, the latest set of complaints against him regarding the dropping of To Kill A Mockingbird from GCSE literature seem a little ill founded.
I was surprised that students were still studying that book, the same one I studied twenty years ago at school since I would have thought that they would have changed on a regular basis, simply because so many new books are written each year. But it's obvious that little has changed in the syllabus in twenty years.
As such I can't help wondering whether most of the invective comes more from the fact that people hate change so much in the UK, as well as having romantic memories of their schooldays. People don't like the idea of their children possibly having a different memory.
I've got nothing against the book, I enjoyed it, and it does have some important lessons within it. But I can't help wondering whether if year after year it begins to lose its relevance. After all, however important the lessons, how easy is it for a teen to relate to such a different culture from a century before and in another country.
Surely if you want to help children to understand it better it would be more relevant to have a book written more recently from the UK. Preferably from a non white author. If this turns out to be the replacement then it makes perfect sense to me - of course that remains to be seen but lets wait first before we complain lest it looks solely because of a fear of change.

Haiku Published

Hot on the heels of my latest Poetry 24 poem I have also had a haiku published in Issue 29 of Haiku Journal.

They publish the haiku online and when they reach fifty they are also published as paperbacks. Please go have a read.

Poem Published

My poem Tit Elation was published by Poetry 24 today, so thanks to them.

Inside

Exhaustion’s morning

Empty brained afternoon

Wild with lethargy

Enthusiastically motionless

Antihistamine fuelled

Caffeine unfulfilled

Sun mockingly bright

Day gloriously cruel

Trapped bitterly

Inside yourself

Inside this body

Inside this mind