I bury my son
the rain falls
cold wet and miserable
I reach for something to say
but I am dumb
struck so
by your demise

We dressed you
in your sweatshirt
and trainers
the clothes had your
smell about them
I waited for you to speak
“Hi Dad I'm home”
but there was only silence

I wake in the middle
of the night
with thoughts of you
and what we might do
that day
then a wave
of remembrance
sweeps over me
and I remember
you are dead

A handful of soil
is my final act
which spatters
where your face
should be
the rain quickly
turning it to mud

I turn away
and see you
in the distance
watching us
as salted rain
runs off my nose

I want to cry out
your name
and ask why?
why and how
we came to this
a father laying his son
to rest
as the world
carries on with
it's own business
oblivious to our
grief
Goodbye my son
I may forgive God
in time
A long, long time

a simple touch away
a breath, a whisper,
a forgotten dream
a remembered smile

I cannot see
nor hear you
cannot touch
nor feel you

yet I know
you are here
my soul tells me so

thus has it been
since the moment
I died

Ethnic Cleansing


You
Blinked in the sun
The laughter ended
Young children lay
Seemingly bathing
As blood ran
From their wounds
Seeping into
The bright green grass
Turning it black
like your soul
You
Gun in hand
Dry eyed
Wept imaginary tears
Imagined fears
Fulfilled
Children’s lives stilled

Bundled rags,
As much a bed
As clothes,
Hang forlorn
From limp hand
That shakes
Spasmodically
As tears mingle with
Dirt fleck mist
Father, Mother
Grandma
Granddad
Sweet sister
Baby brother
All gone
On the train
Leaving you behind
To weep
At your loss
Now
And forever
In the future

This then
The last train
To Auschwitz-Birkenau

My daughter’s
Happy smiling face
At three years of age
Ran through my mind and
Stayed long enough to
Make me smile
As the roadside bomb
Blew her memory
And me
To bits

I barely heard the shot
The dull thud that
Sent your head rocking
This way and that
Surprised you gasped
An 'oh' and I
Felt you slump

I tried so hard
In vain
To contain
The bone and brain
So as not to lose
Any part of you but
There was too
Much blood for me
To stem the flow

In death as in life
You covered me
With your warmth

Once I knew an Angel
She gently held my hand
When I was a stranger
Lost in a strange land

She helped me combat my fears
Shielding me from the fight
Guiding my soul back
To the magic of the write

Silence now I hear
No more my Angel’s voice
Whether this is by design
Or not through her own choice


I guess I’ll never know
I’m just left to wonder why
My Angel had to go

In a dream I wandered through the cathedral of death
the dust and smoke catching me in my throat
as I counted myriad of souls that flew past me
Amazed, were they, at how they now were, lost and bewildered.

And some so fresh, not of the first to die, responders
so called, who came to help, to rescue and became
part of the event, surprised in the act of dying
desperately trying to contact their loved ones

even in death, and the white dust covering all
even those who, in their mistaken belief thought
that they were martyrs and in some spiritual world
for heroes  and deservedly so, looking, for virgins

but all they found was disillusion as they wept for
those whom they had dispatched to oblivion with one
fell swoop and through a trick of fate and time they
saw the future and what it would bring and were ashamed.

The dull
red clouds
at evening
that caught
my consciousness
and held it
made me think
I would give
one leg
to be able
to see
all this
one day after
I was dead

A sonnet

Soft list' upon the conversation spake
may it inform your 'quisitive senses
Light your imagination,  set awake ,
So let this knowledge make some  recompense

For you have been left in the dark too long
once wise are you now blind and unforeseen
untold about the secret goings on
but sense and scent describe what all has been.

look to the rose when thorns get in the way
of it being picked, and smelled and cherished, so
in time will scorn them and put them away
And will no more to let their sharpness grow.

So cold revenge what shape now wilt thou take
to **** that lust yet keep the urge awake.

White eyes , ebony smooth skin
Like chocolate and cream
A room full of sleeping children
How peaceful they dream

Yet they are not sleeping
A simple mistake
They are in a coma
From which they never wake

On their blood feeds
Mosquito flies
Every half minute
A child dies

Malaria nets at a few dollars each
Could save the life of a child
In the rest of the world
Malaria has been exiled

And now occurs
A terrible thought
If the rest of the world was black
Would these nets not be bought?

Do you think?

Head throbbing
Lungs bursting
Rain beating against my face

Arms numb
Legs cramped
Pain excruciating in its embrace

Hands swollen
And screaming,
I wonder why I’m here

Cannot remember
Cannot think
Nothing is clear

Looking out
I see people
Women and men.

Looking down
I see faces
Do I know them?

Noises
Shouts
Anger and tears

I seem to be
The focus of
All their fears

Mouth dry
I cry out
A drink is sent

A sponge
Well soaked
My thirst is vent

Thunder
Lightning
The sky is rent

A spear in my side
And my life is spent.

Every day
The train
There
And back again
A face
Yours
In the crowd
I smile
You shine
Fingers touch
A shock
We retreat
To recover
And wait
Another day

Then alone
I make the journey
For weeks
Months
Truth descends
Reality hits home
I will never see you again

(part 1)

Have you forgotten us?
We, who, taken from our homes
Our families and friends
Were shunted like cattle
In railway boxes fit for pigs
Yet treated worse than either.

Have you forgotten us?
We, who were stamped and numbered
Stripped and tortured
Bruised and beaten
Used as playthings for perverted men.

Have you forgotten us?
We, who were stripped naked
And bundled into innocent looking rooms
Whose clinical stench
Belayed their hidden purpose.

Have you forgotten us?
We, who screamed with terror
Drowning the laughs
Of those outside
As steel faucets
Belched forth death.

Have you forgotten us?
We, the millions of children
Who like rotting manure
Were bulldozed into
Bottomless pits
Turning them into mountains.

(part 2)

Have you forgotten us?
You, who protest so loudly, so bitterly
Against the use of animals
In scientific experiments.
No one protested
When they used us.

Have you forgotten us
You, who care so much for your old
Your sick and your disabled,
Our old were clubbed to death
Our sick were left to die
Our disabled were used for sport.

Have you forgotten us?
You, who lovingly protect your children.
Ours were wrenched away from us
Ours were used for ****** perversions,
Ours were skinned alive.
No one protected them.

Have you forgotten us?
You, who found the camps
The massive ovens
The mountains of bodies
The hoards of hair and teeth
The human skinned lampshades.

Have you forgotten us?
You, who murdered us.
Are you deaf to our cries?
Were they simply orders?
Were you just soldiers?
Didn’t you really know?

Have you forgotten us?
You the world we left behind.
Can thirty years really dull
Your memory of it all?
Did it really happen?
Wasn’t it all exaggerated?

(part 3)

So now we look down
We thirty million or so
At the indifference
The political cover-ups
The bland excuses
The half-hearted attempts at justice.
The murderers who live
In luxury and power
The monsters of earth
Who created hell
The generation who forgot
The generation who never knew
The generation who will never know
The jackboots
The *******
The Nazis’ salute

(part 4)

Yes you have forgotten us.

Yawning in the theatre
Sleepy Helen dozed,
Unimpressed by the performance
Her eyes tightly closed.

Richard of Gloucester,
Eyes all red and sore,
Has to be prompted his lines
As Helen begins to snore.

The man next to Helen nudges her
His face all puffed up and red,
Helen oblivious to his nudging,
Thinks she’s tucked up in bed

Torch in hand the usherette comes
And shines it in Helen’s face
But she is deep in her slumbers
And the manager mutters disgrace.

The attention of the audience shifts
From the stage to the fourth row down
And even the actors fall silent
As Helen begins to frown

She rises from her seat like a Queen
And makes for the steps to the stage
And as she sets foot on the boards
Gloucester flies off in a rage.

She turns to face the audience,
Their interest in the stage renewed
And still deep in her slumbers
Mutters, ‘We are not amused!’

The S M rants and raves
Well for him that’s nothing new
And Gloucester comes back swearing,
The air now turning quite blue.

But Helen is no longer with them
She’s lost all interest you see,
In her dreams she’s back at the palace
With Prince Albert and afternoon tea

Colourless, white and grey
The snow,
Outside, cold, blinding, unfriendly.
Inside grey.
Grey walls, grey floor, grey ceiling,
Grey faces, grey eyes, unfriendly grey
And cold.

Four a.m. breakfast.
Porridge, fish broth and bread.
Judges, priests, high-ranking officials,
Jews, writers, dissenters,
Now a series of numbers,
Queue wearily for their food.
Work Team C.S.S. Building

They eat, without sound, without taste, without pleasure.
Grey soup, grey porridge, grey bread.
The priest mumbles some prayers,
The judge sits upright – elite.
The two Muscovites talk politics.
All Citizens of the Socialist State.

Four-thirty a.m.
Twenty degrees below freezing,
The work party is counted out,
Five, ten, fifteen, twenty...
Citizen Guard count carefully now
....twenty-five, thirty, thirty-five...
Count one short Citizen Guard
And you’ll fill the gap yourself.

Eight guards, armed and warm,
Two dogs, hungry and wild.
Five abreast we march,
Hands behind backs, eyes forward.
A step to the right or left
And you’re dead, shot
Or torn to shreds.

Five-thirty and we arrive.
It is the site for the new power house.
Counted again, guards posted
And the team leaders take over.
Citizen guard discards his cigar ****
And two men fight to retrieve it;
The snow claims it first.

Fire made and water boiling
We mix the mortar.
Building blocks piled high
Trowels at the ready,
Work rate fixed, we begin
And heaven help the man
Who fails to pull his weight.

Trowels glide over steaming mortar,
Just a thin layer,
Put too much on and come the summer
It will all just melt away.

More mortar, more mortar for number two.
More water! Hurry man, hurry
The boiler’s running dry.
More wood! More wood!
No, not coal,
We want fire not smoke – no wood?
Then pull down the stairs.

The sun is overhead.
It is one o clock.
I remember reading where the Americans
Believe it is Twelve Noon when the sun is high!
Ah! If the Soviet Government says it is one
Then by God, whilst you’re in Russia
It’s one.

Time for rations.
It’s a good job the porridge has no taste
Because it looks alarmingly vile
But it fills your guts
And while you can feel it
Weighing heavy as you move,
You’re contented.

Of course there’s no nourishment
To be got from it,
We’d be better off eating grass!
And so we would,
If there were any.
I’ve lost three teeth in eight years
Through crunching this bread.

Break over, back to work.
Stoke the boiler,
More wood! More water!
More mortar for number one!
You lazy sons of lice.

It’s getting darker.
The wall is now at chest height,
We’ve done well
And we got good rates.
It’s getting colder now,
The nightly lowering
Of the temperature begins.

They count us out again.
Why I don’t know,
Where would we go?
What would we eat?
You could walk for a week
And still see nothing but snow;
Like as not you’d be dead by the first night.

Isaac is limping.
I saw him earlier,
His big toe was swollen black.
I saw him lift the trowel
And heard the dull thud
But I couldn’t watch.
Crazy Jew!
He’ll get ten days if they find out.

Ten days! That’s a laugh.
Two out of three die by the first night,
They just freeze up
Like wet sheets left out
In a frost,
Stiff as boards.
Crazy....

Now we’re running!
Are they mad?
Why are we running?
Copjezc, why are we running?
The maintenance group returning?
God no! If they get there first
We’ll get no supper tonight
Ruin you *******, run.
A night without food,
Half of us will be dead by morning.
Run! Run!

I hear screaming.
It’s the dogs,
If I turn my head
I can just see without slowing down...
Isaac!
Crazy ******......

Come on feet run, run,
Run or be dammed.
We’re going to make it.
Poor Isaac. Still he’s out of it now.
Come on citizen guard
Count us in – we’re hungry.

Ten o clock, supper.
Fish broth, porridge and bread.
Red faces, sparkling eyes,
Tired but warm.
We worked like hell today
And been fed three meals.
Time for a smoke.

All in all it’s been a good day.
I stole an apple,
Found a piece of metal
From a guard’s buckle,
It’ll make a good knife.
Yes! If the next five hundred days
Are no worse,
I might even start praying again.

Wi yer eyes stingin n wet wi tears
N muk bungin up tha nose n ears
N a white rimmed ed where thi's ad thi hat
Up tha floats on't lift like a drownded rat

After twelve hours tha's pretty dun in
Whilst t'other folks as been kippin n dreamin
Tha's bin diggin n drillin like summart daft
Now up tha floats on't hydraulic raft

The cold morn air meks tha lungs urt
Cause tha's bin breathin muk n dirt
Fer nigh on forty years or more
That most folks wudn't ave on't floor

N as tha washes all't muk away
Tha knows thas sum that'll allus stay
N whilst outside tha luks nice n clean
Tha's stuff inside thi th't'll never be seen

Until o course tha's gon n died
N them docter fellers tek a look inside
N in amazement they'll stand n stare
At all that muk th't shudn't be there

N wen tha's ded it'll be nowt new
Not too a bloke what's lived like you
Fer now tha's on'y six feet under
Wen undreds is what thas bin used to

N't Crowner'll say thi ad a natural death
Not like them th't had their last breath
At sixteen, seventeen, twenty or more
When sum big explosions brought ceiling t floor

But a doubt if tha'll think it wer thi turn
As tha lays there nattering t worm
Crawlin in n out o yer ears
Not much t show fer sixtyodd years

Still what else cud you ave dun, that's it
But follow yer old man down pit
A mean even his dad was a facer tha knows
Kem out at thirty wi' ands like claws

Ah well it's time fer sum grub
Then half-a-dozen pints't pub
Wi an hour or two o noonday sun
Then back t wife fer an hour o fun
N be six next morning I'll be feelin well
As I teks yon raft t bowels of 'ell
Thirty shillin a week be summer the reckonin
Ah but then they can't see yon worm beckonin


Remember this is a 'Performance Poem'
and the style of writing acts as a
speech prompt. The accent is loosely
Yorkshire. A 'Crowner 'is an old word
for a Coroner.
I hope you enjoy it.

© David Irwin Phillips 2008