Liberty, Equality, Humanity
this is the future
unmanned aerial vehicles
war without soldiers
~
n.b. Eventually, no human risk to intervention, weapons fight weapons, just civilian casualties.
Who will prevail? The belligerent with most money. Something not previously the case, as the wealthy nations don’t like to see too many of their poorer sons sacrificed. See Vietnam, Afghanistan, Suez, Iraq, Sudan.
CLP 30/05/2023
'Bakhmut is Gone' now
its name remains on a map
shells have left mere shells
~
n.b. Today the New York Times shows film taken from a drone of the broken city. Three people huddled by a wall, checking whether it is safe to creep around the corner of a block, on their journey to god knows where, through the rubble.
An explosion splays dirt and debris in the air, as another another artillery round lands. Vandalism on a municipal scale.
So, this is what Moscow argues is the price Ukrainian people must pay to be ‘freed’ from self-rule and government by their own elected representatives. This is liberation?
CLP 23/05/2023
on empty platform
I coulda, woulda, shoulda
your train long departed
~
n.b. When’s the last train?
CLP 11/05/2023
attack on suburbs
a three year old child victim
where remains safe now?
~
n.b. The bereaved mother thought the war was “far away” from their home on the outskirts of Dnipro, but sadly not, The Guardian reports this morning.
What, with killings like this and the forced deportation of children from occupied areas of Ukraine, the men in Moscow and their hand-maidens in the ministries, have clearly given up hope of any salvation under the terms of their Orthodox religion.
CLP 29/04/2023
Let us not pretend
Names are unimportant
Words are deployed like
Booby-trapped IEDs
If you trip the wire
It cannot be defused
Nor put back
In the ground
Shrapnel
Piercing hearts
Fragmenting arguments
Through misnomers
Call this war
Of words and minds
While children lie
Broken
Under collapsed
Apartment blocks
~
n.b. Day 427 (I think).
CLP 26/04/2023
Flapping desperately on the highway
Trying to escape its precarious position
In the centre of the outside lane
Strangely stuck to the tarmac
Black wings flashing deep blue
When catching the last light
What drew it down here?
What prevented escape?
A bit of victim blaming, I admit
Did this crow delay departing?
Stay for one last peck
of the warm flesh that caught its eye?
On-coming couples in cosy cars
Saw the distressed crow ahead
Feathers thrashing a syncopated beat
Each driver steering carefully over
So not to be the one to end the misery
Hopelessly hoping it might escape, as once they did
~
CLP 08/04/2023
‘We’ll laugh about this one day’ you said
As the first handful of soil smuttered on the lid
I looked at the other lads, all smart that day, in black coats
‘Unlikely’ I'd replied, ‘There’s nothing funny about it.’
Typically, it was sunny, belying the mood
Daffodils dancing happily in the onshore breeze
A few puffy clouds sliding past, against the azure
We turned back into town, found The Nelson
Stood in the backyard, Jim wanted a smoke
Dissecting the night that went so tragically wrong
People on the next table joked about our suits
Which is when our Phil finally snapped
‘You think it’s funny? We’ve just buried out mate.’
He said it was worth it, when he got out six months later
~
n.b. NaPoWriMo 2023, a surprising laugh. Tricky prompt, to be fair.
CLP 05/06/2023
three a.m. again
memories of you flood back
vixen barks in street
~
CLP 01/04/2023
westerly pulling at loose coat hoods
white horses whispering of rain
turnstones picking through kelp
gulls laughing from beachfront roofs
wet sand slowly filling in footprints
faint moon fading in morning azure
Venus sinking with all our hopes
~
CLP 30/03/2023
another Spring dawns
war without clear beginning
with no end in sight
~
n.b. The men in Moscow prefer a war economy to something better. Ukraine is being steadily reduced to the new Flanders Fields, where the prospect of better weather, leads to the prospect of increased conflict.
CLP 29/03/2023
Journey of Words 