I wrote this poem as a tribute to all the soldiers sent overseas by their political masters, few of whom rarely go themselves. Many aren’t fortunate enough to return home, or come home terribly injured, not all of which can be seen.
I’m extending that tribute to all of the children who because certain politicians think that school shootings are a “fact of life” and “they have to get over it.” may well also not be coming home in the future. What is wrong with these people!

The sun shines very brightly now
Perhaps there is hope in our hearts
We struggle out from warm bedclothes
In sleepy fits and waking starts.
And time moves on as always
It waits not once for us
Tomorrow comes inexorably
Arriving without fuss.

For none of us can yet evade
That relentless passage of time
It’s how we choose to live our lives
Will dictate our chapter’s rhyme.
For in the end it matters
How we chose to live those lives
For life that’s lived in using pen
Achieves far more than sword-shaped knives.

And when the tide of hatred flows
There are those we should consider
Where fires are always being stoked
By those selling arms to the highest bidder.
The bottom line for the armourer
Is not about life, but death
They care not a jot for that innocent child
Or the fact that they stole their last breath.

So thus the sky clouds over
As cordite fills air once more
And some men will make more profit
As others set off to war.
That ever present danger lurks
And fear the watchword now
Where all would like a peaceful life
The ‘bloody’ question is how?

And politicians play their games
They’re juggling with your lives
But they don’t stand and face the foe
Or carry sword-shaped knives.
No sir, that job belongs to those
Who stand at the front and defend
And take the bullets and the danger
While politicians only pretend.

The sun shines very brightly now
Perhaps there was hope in our hearts
But some now lying in their beds
Await prosthetic body parts.
And time will still march slowly on
Though the innocence is no longer there
And the politicians have made their play
And the cost? They just don’t care.

©Joe Wilson – The cost…2016(2024)

The starting point.

When first I saw you I fell in love
A die was cast so long ago
And thus with so much love betwixt
We sought the reverend to bind us so.

For almost fifty years we loved
Our thoughts so much entwined
I loved you each and every day
To my tender soul you were e’er so kind.

I loved you through all my yesterdays
Your essence still fills my heart
And even though you now have gone
We will never be far apart.

©JoeW 2023

The leaves are losing their green mantle now

As Autumn fully takes over from Summer sun

From green to red, yellow and then gone

But not the beech, hanging on, and how.

Soon they will be brown and dried

Their crinkled leaves look like a frown

 And as the leaves all ‘skritch and skratch’

It becomes quite clear that Summer has died.

For when you raise your eyes to see

The skeletal branches of trees now bare

There’s nowhere now for birds to hide

And Winter waits to be set free.

©Joew2023

His heart just followed her when she left
He was cast adrift in a world of emptiness
And though he really sought to carry on
He always felt under a deep kind of stress.
But then one day he found another
And his heart was melted again
But his hesitancy makes him resist her
Because he’s frightened of more pain.
And so he’s trapped or so he thinks
But his lonely heart has other plans
She draws so deeply into him
That loneliness gets no chance.
So now he has a different life
With a new love once again
The future looks much brighter now
It’s a shame it’s just pretend.

©JoeW2023

You lie in all my many thoughts – The Presence of Love…Samuel Coleridge

When first I saw you I fell in love

A die was cast so long ago

And thus with so much love betwixt

We sought the reverend to bind us so.

For almost fifty years we loved

Our thoughts so much entwined

I loved you each and every day

To my tender soul you were e’er so kind.

I loved you through all my yesterdays

Your essence still fills my heart

And even though you now have gone

We will never be far apart.

©JoeW 2023

Now wind I down from my life’s work
Though think not I that one should shirk
Yet sitting now to take a pause
In life there is no ‘lazy’ clause.
So amble on about my way
I move from dawn to end of day
And though I fear I nought have gained
In this, my world I am remained.

The lark, the blackbird still to see
And beauty in the flowers for me
I’ll oft walk barefoot on green grass
As think I of my once held lass.
In my heart she will reside
For evermore be by my side
And memories now just make me smile
For I have passed the lonely mile.

©JoeW – Love remains…2023

Inside his head, all was black

black,       black,       black

he couldn’t think straight

he was overcome

with such dark thoughts

it was not him at all

he was feeling a rage

as if he was in the grip

of a mad man.

There was no one there

to ease the pain anymore

and that was when he knew

what it was, it was grief

the pain of being alone.

No warm body following

his body contours and

smelling of strawberries

no soothing voice

when he felt troubled

no more ‘I love you’

before they went to sleep

each night, no cuddles.

How long does lonely last?

You can find anything

on the internet, no,   no

you can’t find a cure

for lonely and that

terrible blackness.

©JoeW 2022

That’s what I’d do.

By the time I got there

I’d calmed down

and was smiling at my lunacy.

and decided that next morning 

I would go up into the loft.

I was going to retrieve my

old mechanical mantel clock.

And so I did.

It wasn’t going, so

I removed the back and took out

the movement, laying it out gently,

for I was my normal calm self by now.

Methodically, as my father had shown me

I took the pieces apart and carefully cleaned

each part using the finest clean oil,

one hundred percent synthetic Liberty oil.

I let the spring soak a while, cleaning 

the face and hands and the rest of the body

then using lint-free cloth to dry the parts

I very delicately began to put it back together.

It was a joy to do, I’d missed just – tinkering.

It reminded me of my dad and family. It wasn’t

all good, but the good far outweighed the bad.

When it was all back together, and after a number

I did take the battery out though

of cups of tea, I sat and admired the clock for

what it was. It was a simple, barely elegant,

Westminster chime, utility mantel clock.

Nothing fancy at all, but it had history.

Where my father got it I don’t know,

but it was always on the sideboard

in the front room. That’s a misnomer too.

The front room was at the back of the house.

It took me till I was a teenager to understand

the vagaries of room naming. It was never a lounge,

more a sitting room really. Why it couldn’t have

just been called the best too I never understood,

but there you go. Anyway, I took the clock

and very carefully, set it down on the mantelpiece.

It was now happily ticking away and I was so happy

to see it there. It never keeps the time as well as

a battery-driven digital movement with a created

tick, but the reassuring tick tock tick tock

is so much more pleasant to listen to when you

lie in bed at night and hear it through the house.

A home needs nice clock in it.

©JoeW…2021