A Cruelty Unbearable…

On 30 Aug 201430 Aug 2014 By jovisgoesIn Belief, Family, Life, Loss, Poetry, Regret, WarLeave a comment

Wandering in my mind looking for reasons
I came across far more questions than answers
Why are so many children of the world dying
Why are so many, many mothers crying
Why is God so cruel to them – but I know
It is mankind that is cruel, it is man.

Why was man put here to be so unkind
Why are we here at all if not to find
A way to learn to treat our sisters
A way to learn to love our children
A way to learn to respect our elders
A way to learn to love with dignity.

Some choose a path that takes them to God
Some choose a different way and yet still hope
Some take a path that leads to their dying
And leave behind their widows and children crying
Can we not yet see that utter pointlessness
Nor see all of the good that we should bless.

A little child lies dying in a hospital crib
Her mother so unwilling now to depart
The shortest of lives that the wee thing lived
Like a stake has been driven right into her heart.
She was killed in the crossfire unintentionally
But she’s no less dead, can we not yet see!

A Cruelty Unbearable…2014

…it will never stop…

On 14 Aug 201414 Aug 2014 By jovisgoesIn heroes, Life, Loss, old age, Poetry, War, wisdomLeave a comment

He sits there reading, happy enough now in his own company
what is it he reads -ah yes – a Tale of Two Cities
a favourite, but one which evokes an old memory
of long ago when he was just a young man.

Of a time when war raged across Europe like a plague
when it was in the grip of a madman bent
on seizing power everywhere and not caring how
and men like him and many of his friends went.

But then there seemed a real purpose to it
and besides, he met Françoise and loved her so
and later with many of his friends now dead
it was over so he went back home with Françoise instead.

Now she also is no more, killed by muggers who were armed
and he sits all alone, no girls, no sons
wondering why his country’s leaders
can never see the futility of all the guns.

Once more the planet rages with war
once more there will be unnecessary deaths
he finds himself wishing the impossible thought
the non-invention of guns, and it leaves him short of breath.

Sadly men would have just found another way to kill each other
– and that is the real problem. It never goes away.

©Joe Wilson – …it will never stop…2014

His regret – the son’s story

On 18 Jul 2014 By jovisgoesIn Family, Loss, Poetry, WarLeave a comment

He sits reading the letter from his father
it is a small reach after all these years
and he is not sure how he will respond
his father was a hero – but he wasn’t there.

It has been hard growing without a dad
his mother never loved anyone else and
always waited, and waited, but he never came
he’d felt so let down, this hero, HERO
and he couldn’t even visit his son
he should feel bitter, and yet
being in the forces himself now
he sort of understands.

He wishes his mother was still alive
she would help him come to a decision
she never stopped loving him, always, always
defending his decision to stay away
he knew she would have agreed to his search
she would be happy for him, she would smile
and he would melt, oh how he missed her
how he’d wished for a mum and dad to love.

He would find him and he would take steps
to see him and ask him why he’d never come home
though he already knew the answer. He didn’t know him
and yet – he had always missed him- and now
he needed to know him – he needed
an anchor to his past life
as he himself was about to go away
he too having a child, a little girl he adored
and he was terrified he too would run away
and the thought was more than he could bear.

Was this just an excuse after all these years
or was he going to use his father’s guilt for his own ends
he wasn’t sure, but he knew that he would do anything
rather than do what his father had done to him
he desperately wanted to know his dad
he missed not having had him around but
he missed his mother so much more.

In the midst of all of his confused emotions

He needed answers…would this man give them……..

©Joe Wilson – His regret-the son’s story 2014

His regret

On 16 Jul 201417 Sep 2015 By jovisgoesIn Belief, Betrayal, Loss, Poetry, Regret, Terror, Time, WarLeave a comment

And so it was his past caught up
a dread for many years
it was time to face reality
and belay his darkest fears.

A time to face a painful truth
he’d never known this child
he’d left when he was just hours old
and the loss had made him wild.

A soldier he’d been sent abroad
to fight for others’ errors
and in the deepness of his mind
he remembered years of terrors.

They’d captured him and half his men
his captain they had killed
and made the rest including him
dig the grave and get it filled.

When he came home he was a wreck
who drank himself to sleep
and though he had had several jobs
they were impossible to keep.

He later found his faith again
and now he has a certain peace
but the fear of meeting his son at last
was filling him with unease.

He wonders if he’ll understand
and how it will work out
but the boy had come and sought him
now he waited full of doubt……..

©Joe Wilson – His regret 2014

Another…gone

On 8 May 2014 By jovisgoesIn heroes, Loss, WarLeave a comment

Born in the county
Raised in the county
Served overseas
Died overseas
Buried in the county.

©Joe Wilson – Another…gone

The Pointlessness of This Kind of Death

On 21 Apr 201421 Apr 2014 By jovisgoesIn Poetry, Point of View, political, Regret, War2 Comments

He stood there with his banner in protest,
wanting no more of his people to die.
But the militiaman guarding the building
fired his gun and he took his last sigh.

Why do people stand there in protest
with others who are of the same mind?
And why did the man fire his weapon
and kill a citizen with whom his name rhymed?

The politics go round and gets nowhere
while poor people have to queue just for bread.
And as long as the ones with the guns hold the cards
in that place DEMOCRACY is dead!

The militiaman was beaten to death by a mob
as the media filmed it, we’re depressed.
The man, he lay broken in the rubble and mess
nothing changed in the continuing unrest.

©Joe Wilson – The Pointlessness of This Kind of Death 2014

A Magical Moment…and then it’s gone!

On 20 Apr 201413 Sep 2014 By jovisgoesIn Loss, Poetry, Point of View, political, Poverty, Regret, Terror, War1 Comment

Within that magical moment
The world is at one and at ease
Everyone is loving their neighbour
And we have control of disease.

But it doesn’t last, it cannot last
It will all go back as before
To the dying from hunger and violence
To man’s unending desire for war.

One man plants a crop for food
But another man reaps the gain
The one making life from the profit
While another’s reward is just pain.

If a man is black, or yellow, who cares!
His blood like yours is red
The bullets or knives that pierce your skins
Would make you both as dead.

A man gets beaten in the street
His crime was being gay
Who gave those others the right to judge
Will prejudice never go away?

The ones with strength to dominate
Should nonetheless take heed
When they themselves are wanting help
Who’ll stay to fill that need.

I hear the ever-growing rains
They flood the town and field
Where hardship’s felt so gravely
Where man is forced to yield.

Perhaps we brought it on ourselves
We feel the need for so much
But there are so many with nothing
Who’d benefit from a gentle touch.

Back to that magical moment
It’s the one just before I awake
Where the next moment comes and it’s over
And it can’t be put right with a shake.

©Joe Wilson – A Magical Moment…and then it’s gone! 2014

Caught in the Crossfire

On 6 Apr 201412 Apr 2014 By jovisgoesIn heroes, Poetry, political, WarLeave a comment

Torture wreaked havoc with his mind’s sanity
The anguish just chilled me to the core
As the beatings continue to reduce him
He is scared he’ll not take too much more.

Again the water washed over and woke him
The bucket clanging as they threw it back down
Once again he was taken to the table
‘Waterboarding‘ I thought with a frown.

He was laid on his back and then tied down
They put towels over his mouth and his nose
They poured and they poured water on him
Once again in his chest panic rose.

A reporter who’d been caught in the crossfire
There was no information he could tell
No amount of hard beatings and torture
Could make him give secrets he’d not held.

Beaten and bloodied he is taken
Back as before to his cell
He’s told them all that he ever could tell them
But he still can’t escape from this hell.

He languishes in his cell I am certain
He cries out for mercy from each pore
I know that they still give him more beatings
I see him as he hobbles past my cell door.

1914 – From Aldershot to Braille

On 26 Mar 2014 By jovisgoesIn Loss, Love, Poetry, Point of View, political, WarLeave a comment

He was sent to Aldershot for training
He would learn how to kill or be killed
The training was all done with broomsticks
When he thought back it made his blood chill.

His unit was sent down to Portsmouth
To board a ship and go over there
It was packed to the gunwales with weapons
And the rations left no room to spare.

He practiced with his rifle on the journey
Like others who’d not held one before
He’d no sense of the horror he’d be facing
Nor the violence he’d always abhorred.

It was such a small piece of shrapnel
Caught both eyes as a shell case shattered
He never saw his two boys as they grew into men
Missing out on so much that had mattered.

His wife who he loved always helped him
And a life with new interests grew
He learnt how to read the braille papers
It pleased him he’d still know the news.

But the trauma from the experience scarred him
And ire with politics grew by the day
So he took to his new odd braille keyboard
And wrote articles and letters to complain.

He could sense the new way that the wind blew
In the corridors of power in the House
There was money to be made in new weapons
And politicians ignore those who grouse.

Then again two decades later it started
Another war that would mean more dead men
The obscenity rose like a bile in his throat
So once again he took to his ‘pen’.

©JRW2014

One in a group of poems recognising the centenary of WWI