"kitchener" poems
Diaspora
From the Greek
When I heard the word I felt it
And I looked it up
In my old red dictionary
I could have used the Internet,
I suppose
But I like to run my forefinger down pages
Of words
I read the definition
And I felt it
Oh
Oh
We are diaspora.
Am I using it correctly?
We are a diaspora.
Diaspora
From the Greek
From the green valley of Ottawa
From Scotland
From Ireland on wooden boats
From the French village thirteen children
From the mines in the North
From Poland and from Germany
From the churches and
From the Blueberry patches
From the Island Manitoulin
From the dark lake Kagawong
From Kinburn and Arnprior
From Markstay and from Sudbury
From Waterloo
From Kitchener, Michener
From the Suburbs
Oh
From the Suburbs
From the red bricks, red currants
And geraniums
From green island cabins
From the desert
Oh
From the desert
From the potholes and pipes
From the salty wind
Cracked Caspian Sea
From the middle of the east of nowhere.
From the mountains
Oh
From the mountains
From the crystal water fountains
From the tram bells
On the cobblestone streets
From the torrents of the Rhein
From the white cross
Oh
From the white cross
On the green hill
From the river Laurence
From the French and from the English
Plains of Abraham
We are diaspora
We are a diaspora
Diaspora
From the Greek
How did it end up here on my tongue?
It is diaspora.
It is a diaspora
Diaspora is a diaspora
And I wonder if it misses its other pieces
The way that I miss mine
Ours
There is no
Roping us back together now
There is no
Home to go back to
There is no
Point of meeting
Of reunion
No
White steeple in our old town
No
Yellow slide in our backyard
No
Old folks on an old farm
No
Walled house on a hill
No
Luzernerring 93
No
Familiar riverwater
There is no
Ancient Greek anymore
Diaspora
Only fragments of fragments
Of roots of stems of words
In different dialects
There is no
Place for you to belong,
Diaspora
You’ve been sliced to pieces
And scattered
Into the wind
But
When people ask you
Where you are from
You say simply
From the Greek
Oh
From the Greek
And
When people ask me
Where I am from
I say simply
From the diaspora.
Oct 19, 2015
Oct 19, 2015 at 10:50 AM UTC
DAYS of the dead men, Danny.
Drum for the dead, drum on your
remembering heart.
Jaures, a great love-heart of France,
a slug of lead in the red valves.
Kitchener of Khartoum, tall, cold, proud,
a shark's mouthful.
Franz Josef, the old man of forty haunted
kingdoms, in a tomb with the Hapsburg
fathers, moths eating a green uniform
to tatters, worms taking all and leaving
only bones and gold buttons, bones and
iron crosses.
Jack London, Jim Riley, Verhaeren, riders to the republic of dreams.
Days of the dead, Danny.
Drum on your remembering heart.
1.3k
They heard the whistle,
necked their ration of ***
put away photographs, letters and bibles
and wished good luck,
then over the top the lads went
They heard the deafening rat a tat tat of the machine guns,
the shells exploding
and saw their friends knees bend and fall
Onwards they ploughed
towards that deathly sound
Heart hammering,
Keep going son, move
Many also died , bloodied in the wire,
They had gained a hundred yards
and thought that posters
in the towns never showed this
with Come lads slip across and help
and Hold up your end
and Kitchener's famous point
What had they said?
Be over by Christmas
No ****** way
The toffs comfortable in their billets
had sent them all to die, forgotten, cannon fodder
that's all and
God has his slippers on an all
Nov 11, 2014
Nov 11, 2014 at 2:02 PM UTC
His last sunrise shone in his eyes
as we readied, aimed and fired.
“Shoot straight you bastards!”“Breaker” yelled
as his life and time expired..
Handcock and Morant together lay
sightless eyes toward the sky.
The courts-martial had convicted them.
Kitchener ordered that they die.
How did I feel about this man
my bullet helped to slaughter?
This man who ordered Boers shot
without a written order.
I’d seen him fight, and bravely too
when Boers struck the town.
The prisoners had manned the line
and helped us hold our ground..
Now stretcher-bearers took their limbs
and bore them from the field.
So fast and secret were their deaths
There was no chance of appeal.
Australians had been killed by Scotch
to please the Dutchman Boers.
British men and Africans-
we were all just following orders.
Feb 1, 2012
Feb 1, 2012 at 8:41 PM UTC
His last sunrise shone in his eyes
as we readied, aimed and fired.
“Shoot straight you bastards!”“Breaker” yelled
as his life and time expired..
Handcock and Morant together lay
sightless eyes toward the sky.
The courts-martial had convicted them.
Kitchener ordered that they die.
How did I feel about this man
my bullet helped to slaughter?
This man who ordered Boers shot
without a written order.
I’d seen him fight, and bravely too
when Boers struck the town.
The prisoners had manned the line
and helped us hold our ground..
Now stretcher-bearers took their limbs
and bore them from the field.
So fast and secret were their deaths
There was no chance of appeal.
Australians had been killed by Scotch
to please the Dutchman Boers.
British men and Africans-
we were all just following orders.
Feb 1, 2012
Feb 1, 2012 at 8:41 PM UTC
As young men left their homes to fight a needless war
Mothers of those soldiers see them off for sure.
They leave and are told the war will be over soon
leaving full of happiness singing wartime tunes
Kitchener said your country needs you
But he didn't really care
he didn't have to go over the top
when gunfire was in the air.
The Young boys fight...go over the top
they know they're not coming back
As they go into no man's land
the guns go crack, crack, crack.
There's a stench of death all around
People dead on the ground
young boys who had a lot to give
Never going home
Someone needs to tell their mum’s
That their babies have gone.
The mums receive a letter telling them their boys have died
they cannot comprehend the facts
they cried, and cried, and cried.
Mothers lost sons
babies lost dads
does anyone really know why
Millions of soldiers went to war and had to ******* die
Soldiers didn't only die from gunshot wounds
They died from illness to
buried in a far away land
graves of masses grew
The soldiers fought a needless war
They say the war was the Great War
but how can war be great
with millions of innocent people
Are now known as the late.
War is pointless and achieves no end.
Politicians set the trend
But still countries want to fight
I can see no point I guess I’m right.
The End
Jun 11, 2017
Jun 11, 2017 at 5:33 PM UTC
Your King and Country need you, men.
Kitchener, glaring in full kit.
Khaki is the color of the day
and everyone must do their bit.
A mighty Empire girds for war
yet unprepared to bleed and die.
Then bands still played patriotic airs;
We cheered them as they marched away.
Belle France’s fields were soon entrenched;
protected with barbed wire fence.
A generation sent to war
will lie forever beneath those fields.
This was the cost too few foresaw
of this war to end all wars.
A cost paid many times since then;
paid in young lives by bad old men.
Jul 24, 2014
Jul 24, 2014 at 8:41 AM UTC