This post is a bit of an experiment. It's a departure from writing posts with a lot of links and references used to back up an argument. For a change, I'm presenting two poems on different themes, each illustrated by photographs I've taken. Sometimes, my photography can be a bit of a window into my soul. Poetry, in most forms, is a window into the soul of the author. I don't write a lot of poetry and I'll confess that I don't read much of it either. However, I'm starting to find it's a way of expressing something that can't adequately be expressed in a conventional piece of writing. If this bombs, I promise there will be no more poems from me! If it gets a decent response, it may be a vehicle I occasionally use to express something that can't be conveyed any other way...
We can't go on like this...
The simple pleasures are free...
Walking through the meadows,
Along the streams and through the woods.
Hearing the gentle breeze stir the leaves,
While the birds twitter, chatter and strut.
Standing still to drink it all in...
Thinking of the sacred spirits past...
The world doesn't have time for free.
The world doesn't have time for standing still.
The world doesn't have time to drink it all in.
The world doesn't have time for the sacred...
Move, grow, grab expand...
Constant pressure, no time to stop,
No time to think, no time to recover.
Distraction and diversion to stop us being who we are,
Pushing us forward so we can never look back...
They rob our souls and drain our spirit,
They quantify who we are,
They track us to control us,
Until we don't know who the f**k we are:(
Something has changed
It's been three years since it all started.
Three long years,
Three strange years,
Three years of...
Disbelief,
Broken trust,
Gaslighting,
Shattered faith...
Who could I trust?
Who could I talk to?
Who the f**k was going to hear me out?
Was it me or was it them?
Was I mad or was I sane?
How could they fall so easily?
Things are back to normal...aren't they?
Are they?
On the surface it feels the same...well, sort of...
Scratch the surface and there's no going back.
It's them and us...
We who woke up...
Those who went along...
Went along and turned on us.
Cut us cold, turned their backs and twisted the knife...
The truth comes out...
The painful truth of loss and damage done.
Some realise their error but fear to admit it.
Others pretend it never happened.
The true believers double down.
That's all they can do because the truth would finish them...
Can we forgive?
Can we forget?
We can never forget the lost years...
To forgive is hard.
First we have to understand...
Many forces were at play...
Malign forces that broke and twisted people's minds.
Malign forces that will do the same again...
There has to be an understanding.
An understanding of who and why...
We have to get to the root no matter how deep and dark it is.
We have to confront the darkness.
Then will come the reckoning...
Everything has changed.
We can never go back,
We can only move forward...
Forward to the fight of our lives...
For a first attempt, your prose is wonderful
If I hadn't seen the picture, I would have still got the picture.
Too many people forget that poetry doesn't always rhyme.
Poetry is about painting pictures for the mind to see