They Said

Tags

Control, creative, faith, Lies, poems, poetry, politics, Promises, They Said, Truth, verse, writing

They said the Sun would always rise,

The clouds would always clear,

They said the light would always burn,

Beneath the wall of tears.

They said that this was all a game,

The rules we never learned,

They said that they would hold our hands,

But never said they’d burn.

They said that we would have our day,

That waiting always paid,

They said that all of this was ours,

Behind their backs the blade.

They said that if we held out nerve,

The steel in our backs,

They said that if we learned to bend,

Our spines would never crack.

They said that when we heard the bell,

We’d know just how to act,

They said that when it came to this,

They’d never break the pact.

They said that time would be our friend,

And shield us from our fears,

They said the Sun would always rise,

And the clouds would always clear.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2000-2019

 

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Wooden Pieces

Tags

Communication, conflict, Creative writing, faith, history, Humanity, Life, poems, poetry, politics, Principles, religion, time, verse, writing

Above the birds circled

Silhouette patterns in the sky,

Monochromatic mosaics which shuffled like aging hands

Moving wooden pieces across a board

In some endless game,

Watching, always watching

Waiting for that killer move

That only Time knew

Would never come,

As far below, talking monkeys

Hurled sticks and stones across the fields,

Reached over the seas to tear the rage on others such as them

Moving invisible pieces across a board

As if they had a goal,

Forgetting that they had the gift

Of sound and word and voice,

Turning time upside down

As if it bore the blame,

And still above their sightless heads

The shadows wove designs,

Building plans like those before who came and failed and fell

Moving broken pieces across a board

As if there were a point,

Waiting, always waiting

Til aching wings gave way

Above the spinning rock

As silent Time fell still.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2018

 

What Use Are My Words?

Tags

Communication, conflict, creative, Creative writing, Depression, faith, history, Inequality, Life, Love, poems, poetry, politics, Principles, Progress, religion, Truth, verse, war, Words, writing

What use are my words

If the shells still fall

From black-heart open skies

And bombs still separate limb

From torso

On a whim?

If lover’s nights are torn asunder

Each phrase of love declared

And punctuated by the rifle’s kiss

As bullets fly through skies

To deafen out the

Infant’s cries?

If families fractured fall apart

Their bodies as their homes

And stuffed in ragged bags

They walk on paths anew

Hopes and lives askew?

 

What use are my words

If every judgement still

Depends on colour, race or creed

And not on who we are

Those who act so blind

Injustice our own kind?

If passion is fuelled by hatred

And shouted from the stands

Evolution’s backward stare

Feet that stomp and pound

Like we never left the ground?

If all that we can show

Is intolerance and hate

To mask the failings in ourselves

To stick within our clan

And say this is the Plan?

 

What use are my words

If all that we believe

Serves not to heal but pull apart –

Words lost behind the rhetoric –

And sets us off to goad

The wrong way down the road?

If our deities stand toe to toe

As we become the baying throng

Applauding every blow

Forgetting that it’s all a game

And they are all the same?

If faith is lost behind the mask

And we think ourselves the show

Where Glory resides in riches

And ceremony makes us tall

Hidden safe behind our wall?

 

What use are my words

If those who shout the loudest –

The basest of our kind –

Earn mandate over all of us

To wield the sharpened sword

And cut the final cord?

If none of us is equal

And power comes through privilege

Whilst on green fields they scheme

To hold on to the wealth

Through division and through stealth?

If birth outweighs our merits

When change is just a word

And nothing brings a greater good

As islands we shall ever stay

To never see a brighter day?

 

What use are my words?

 

We Waited

Tags

creative, faith, poems, poetry, politics, religion, Truth, verse, writing

We waited in the dust

We stood there in the sand,

We wallowed in our comfort

Waiting for a hand.

We waited in the snow

We slipped beneath the ice,

We swallowed down our pride

But never asked the price.

We waited in the temple

We knelt before the sign,

We waited for forgiveness

A gift that wasn’t mine.

We waited by the water

We hoped would wash us clean,

We stared towards the sky

For things we’d never seen.

We waited for redemption

Absolution from our sin,

We waited out forever

To find we hoped on nothing.

 

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2018

Waif

Tags

Childhood, creative, Inequality, poems, poetry, politics, Power, Truth, verse, writing

A wallflower

Still and rooted

Held fast by threads invisible,

Bare-footed and

Lithe-limbed

Dirt ingrained like DNA

Seeping through veins

That know no different,

Knees tucked

Up tight beneath

A chin scuff-marked

By experience’s children

Grazes which, like timeless heirlooms,

Pass down the ages

Storm waters of our age

As older eyes,

Nicotine-yellow,

Look no further than today,

And those judgemental

On high-borne thrones

Cast down their bones

Complete the wall

And keep the wheels

In motion.

We Kneel

Tags

conflict, creative, Creative writing, faith, history, poems, poetry, politics, religion, Truth, verse, writing

We kneel the same way

You and I

Faces like mirrors

Reflecting the futures

Our plans were made for

Trusting in the benevolence

Of something more

Something greater

Than the sum of all our parts

The wishes that we share

The words whose bloodied kisses

Stain our days –

And for how long need we free

The same words,

Now tired and frail,

Bereft of meaning?

We kneel the same way

You and I

And yet our voices

Never meet.

Borrowed Time

Tags

Communication, creative, hope, Inequality, lyrics, poems, poetry, politics, Poverty, verse, writing

Some say that the old ones are the best.

Others that they are merely the oldest.

This ‘song’, which fell out a drawer recently, belongs to the latter.

The melody shall remain locked away.

Ran on down through the night

Passed the high shot pusher on the corner,

A hundred hungry faces cried

A thousand tears of sorrow.

 

Saw the lost on the pavements

Met the all-day fallen on park benches,

Watched the closing of cafes

The all night sanctuaries.

 

A street light lit the alley

Old man crying in the gutter alone,

Hollow girls in the doorways

Promise of escape for some.

 

A wallet slips into the night

A thousand hands reach for offering,

A knife shines in the road

The broken hearts reach out.

 

Night time lovers flit across the sky

Don’t hear the dying breaths downtown,

The misplaced and abandoned

Souls that can’t go on.

 

The downtown joys of such men

Can’t feel the pain of life,

Too many broken hearts

Which live on borrowed time.

All You Ever Wanted

Tags

creative, faith, Philosophy, poems, poetry, politics, religion, verse, writing

We gave you all
You ever wanted
And sat and watched
From thrones your eyes ignored
And now your faces
Crack like Arctic floes
As if you never knew
The price you’d have to pay
The collapse your hearts
Knew had to come
The debt you chose
A willing blindness to
And we will not
Be held to account
For all the pain
You ladle with ease
We gave you all
You ever wanted
And now our names
You spit with curses
And now your faces
Crack like Arctic floes
But come the Winter
We know to whom you’ll turn.

Eyes Away

Tags

conflict, creative, death, poems, poetry, politics, verse, war, writing

Blistered images
Pictures fractured, torn
Humanity shattered
Scarlet pools
Evaporating like dreams
Beneath a mocking
Sun god
Whose laughter rings
Clear over
The exploding back-beat
A ceaseless rhythm
Pounding skins
The big finish
The chaotic crescendo
That never comes
As Jazz-like
The players search
For the killer note
The deathly chord
With which to stun
And silence
The pleading throng
Whose voices lost
Lie broken
Amidst the shrapnel
And charred-black
Body parts of those
Who saw no need
Yet were the fodder
Of foolish greed
That has no recourse
To higher law –
And who’s to say
It’s all the same –
And still the salt falls
Drowned silent by
Blame and counter-blame
And a sky lit beautiful
A midnight rainbow
Beneath which
No gold glitters
And hope lies twisted
In hues of retribution
And those who cry
‘Is this what we’ve become?’
As in water’s flow
They wash their hands
And turn their
Eyes away.