Tag: regret

A new start…

On By jovisgoesIn Family, Life, Loss, Love, Poetry1 Comment

He walked down the length of that long lonely street
His footsteps tapping a short rhythmic beat
He encountered no one at that time of day
There was no one to stop him and have their say.

It was a dark three o’clock in the morning
As he wandered aimlessly along the road
But it wasn’t as if he had any place to go
He was only but another poor homeless Joe.

He was on the search for some food or scrap
New enough still to hate this poverty trap
Recently separated, he lost his job and his home
He now find’s himself on the road, where he roams.

He’s tried very hard to keep his dignity too
Not mixing much with the others who do
And he now walks about with an air of fake calm
Thinking that might protect him from coming to harm.

It had never occurred to him that he was always at work
His wife needed more, he understood that too late
Over years it had taken a hard marital toll
So she’d stepped away from him and he’d lost his role.

But he wouldn’t give in, he was determined about that
He desperately told himself every day
He couldn’t let himself live like this for long
He felt if he said so that he would remain strong.

His wife said she still loves him, despite that she left
He caused her such pain and he feels so bereft
But as long as she loves him it gives him some hope
He’ll fight his way back up this steep darkened slope.

He walked down the length of that long lonely street
You could hear a slight lightness to the short rhythmic beat
His eyes filled with tears as his wife filled his heart
Determined he walked on to make a new start.

 

©Joe Wilson – A new start…2014

In mortal pain…

On By jovisgoesIn Anger, Armageddon, Belief, Betrayal, carelessness, Fate, Life, Poetry, Point of View, political, Regret, The World, WarLeave a comment

This land has been robbed of all that it had
Nothing is left, even for the slick and the rich
Crumbling edifices to our capitalist greed
Our world no capacity now left for its need.

There were those amongst us who fought agin this
Imprisoned in jails within our own tortured selves
Not enough of us tried to stop the horrors we saw
Now nothing is left, our charade is no more.

Your fathers all fought in such bloody campaigns
There fathers too, and there fathers before
New weapons of destructive powers previously unheard
That slaughtered the innocent in ways cruelly absurd.

Buildings left standing with all inside dead
People didn’t matter, but the real estate did
And thus the corruption swept over the Earth
We were judged by our value but not by our worth.

It angers me now as I feel guilty shame
For I didn’t do enough and that makes me as them
And for you with the mess whatever is left
There’s a world that was rich and is now so bereft.

One thing is certain, save the wealth of the land
The one crucial thing that we never did foresee
Don’t go down the pathway of war-like inventions
Create things for peace and for better intentions.

Think in these ways and you may stand a chance
It’s a message I couldn’t ever iterate to much
War and corruption lie together in bed
Growing good crops gets communities fed.

©Joe Wilson – In mortal pain…2014

…nagging doubts…

On By jovisgoesIn Betrayal, Life, Love, PoetryLeave a comment

To be free of this nagging doubt
Oh to be free of this pain
I know that I’ll never miss her
I don’t want to see her again.

Why beat myself then I wonder
Could it be there is still a spark
She was cruel and she hurt me on purpose
And yet…

I don’t know now, I loved her so deeply
The days pass much slower now she’s gone
Even now I still can’t forget her
Till I do I’ll never move on.

If I go to our old haunts I’ll see her
I wonder if she’ll still be with him
I can’t bear to think of or to go there
But the chances I won’t are so slim.

I’ll just watch some telly and forget her
I’m sure there’s some pointless tat on
But the nagging doubts are driving me crazy
I give in, my coat’s already on…

©Joe Wilson – …nagging doubts…2014

The cruel hand of fate…

On By jovisgoesIn Family, Fate, Friendship, Illness, Life, Loss, Personal, Poetry, Regret2 Comments

Things were very different in the Sixties
Everything was like new fresh breath
But this sad, true tale of my childhood
Is the tale of a friend’s early death.

Peter helped the Co-op grocers delivery-man
After he’d finished school for the day
He’d sit on an upturned milk crate
And they drove merrily along on their way.

He’d helped the man deliver for ages
It was what teenage boys would often do
But as the van took a corner in Rising Brook
Out to his sad fate Peter flew.

The van only had the single driver’s seat
No one else was supposed to be there
And the doors all slid back and stayed open
Safety wasn’t really thought about to be fair.

So out of the van my friend Peter flew
And fate treated him so very very cruel
He disappeared right under a passing bus
Right in front of the gates to his school.

My best friend was Harry, Peter’s brother
And for him everything changed on that day
I watched Harry wither before me
As his spirit of mischief flew away.

Just a few years later Harry drifted
I’ve not seen him from that day to now
But I hope he was able to find for himself
A way to survive the horror somehow.

I’ve not spoken of this since those dark days
and the flood of the memory is still raw
If only I could step back and warn him
My friend, please, please close the door.

By a sad twist of irony I lost my brother as well
He was struck down by the first ‘Asian Flu’
That memory hurts like a stab in the heart
I was twenty, he was just twenty-two.

 

©Joe Wilson – The cruel hand of fate…2014

Sadly, this is entirely true. Peter was killed falling under a bus in this manner and my brother was a recently married policeman who died of so-called ‘Asian Flu’ in 1970.

Well we know where we belong don’t we?

On By jovisgoesIn Dreams, Life, Poetry, Point of View, political, The WorldLeave a comment

I know my Place

(With a respectful nod to Messrs. Cleese, Barker & Corbett)

He looked out of his fine high-ceilinged office
He looked down at the city far below
With sleeves rolled up and his blood pressure mounting
Profits missing meant workers had to go.

He didn’t care where they would come from
Little people never registered on his screen
He was totally focussed on making dollars
In that he was absolutely obscene.

A little way down from his high pedestal
Was where those desperate celebrities abide
Where they sit wafer-thin in dark glasses
As they feed like piranhas on the crowds.

And though the Hollywood moguls will use them
Because they are the puppets that they are
All memories of where they all came from
Are now just a small thing in the past.

Lower still you will find politicians
All waiting for the moment that is theirs
When they have the glory of the ‘fifteen minute fame’
Before they fall back to their own obscurity.

We on the other hand gather down in the street
Like sheep we wait there in the hope that we’ll meet
A top businessman who might give us a position
Or perhaps for a glance at a celebrity snob.

And just up above the media vultures hover
As they hope for a juicy story to break
They’ll not care a fig for the lives they devour
Just the ratings for them are at stake.

As they say ‘T’was ever thus’ and it shall ever be
And it seems that frankly it can only get worse
You see my fine friend it’s not the humans involved
It’s simply the size of the ever-growing purse.

©Joe Wilson – Well we know where we belong don’t we? 2014

Whisky and my pen…

On By jovisgoesIn Life, Loss, Love, Poetry, RegretLeave a comment
Faceted whisky glass
Faceted whisky glass

 

Wind blows its way right through my senses
All my thoughts have but slowly disappeared
One more large smoky glass of cheap whisky
One more sad lonely night that you’re not here.

Loneliness set in as the door quickly closed
Using the back door now and keeping that one shut
It will stay like that until ever you come back
But I’ve a notion now that it will stay put.

Old sore wounds that somehow resurfaced
Caused a bitter rift long forgotten to return
And the memories and the tears from the last time
Hit the heart, exploded and then burned.

So I sit trying to write and supping whisky
As I wait to hear your key in the front door
I hope with all my heart that you’ll forgive me
I can’t bear to be alone here any more.

The wind is getting stronger now and I thought I heard the latch
But it was just some fighting creatures out in the dark
So I’ll wait as I do each night with my whisky and my pen
Sitting here and waking up with the sound of the lark.

 

©Joe Wilson – Whisky and my pen 2014

There is only one Earth…

On By jovisgoesIn carelessness, Poetry, Regret, Time, Wildlife14 Comments

Help earth_edited

I look in wonder at all I see
each flower, tree, bird and bee.

All these amazing things on earth
that fill its air and all its girth.

But what do we civilised animals do
we cut them, burn them, shoot them too.

We ravage forests for our own needs
ignoring harm we do to breeds.

We only think about ourselves
of stocking up our winter shelves.

Or eating so we get so fat
you don’t see ‘animals’ doing that!

We fill the skies with poisonous gases
killing each other with bombing passes.

Destroying wildlife habitats
to build new roads and boxy flats.

That stop the waters soaking in
and flood the lands that we live in.

And then we have a conference
where those who care get all incensed.

As promises and targets are pencilled in
with chance of actions wearing thin.

In years to come when it’s too late
we’ll wonder why we let it wait.

©Joe Wilson – There is only one Earth…2014

It’s getting a little late…

The scorn…

On By jovisgoesIn Betrayal, Family, Life, Loss, Poetry, War2 Comments

knights_templars_by_rumbles-d4o9ywk
He always walks with head so bowed
Keeping from the other’s crowd
For he has shame and guilt to bear
And for mocking voices he doesn’t care.

He once bore arms and was a knight
But turned once he from noble fight
And now a coward brand bears he
Upon his face for all to see.

But none can know just why he turned
Why battle honour he had spurned
They cannot know the man he’d fight
His father, that was this man’s plight.

For father fought on evil’s side
A fight against their family’s pride
And now he bears this wicked scorn
His father’s sin, the family torn.

©Joe Wilson – The scorn…2014

He walked a willing mile…

On By jovisgoesIn Anger, Betrayal, Love, Poetry, RegretLeave a comment

He walked a willing mile
To see if all was lost
He made a dreadful error
And he feared the awful cost.

He walked the mile to see her
He knew he’d been so wrong
The slight that he had caused
The evidence seemed so strong.

He’d realised that he was wrong
Another had poisoned his mind
And he had been so gullible
He’d not been very kind.

Love’s tricky path he realised
Was a difficult place to tread
With dark and cruel danger
If you let others into your head.

So now he walked the willing mile
In the hope of being forgiven
And though he knew it wasn’t due
He’d grovel if he was driven.

She hurt so much as she saw him
Anger and love filled her heart
She’d make him earn her forgiveness
But she’d never drive them apart.

But she wondered why men were so foolish
Why they took other’s words with such ease
Why sometimes they only worked at love
As if they were shooting the breeze.

©Joe Wilson – He walked a willing mile…2014

His regret – the son’s story

On 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