Category Politics

Hiraeth

freyathewriter 27 Comments 
Hiraeth
Hiraeth
Cymru am byth
in these stones lieth
rain, never-ending
turning streams into rivers
turning the wheel
the wheel
the wheel
breaking the stones
the bones
the bones
silver and lead
bring out your dead
count them
count them
bring out your dead

Hiraeth
Hiraeth
Cymru am byth
work them to death
for a crust of dark bread
darken the doorsteps
with the smuts on your breath
put them in barracks
work them to death
poison their bodies
with deadening lead
filling their pockets
with bones and dread
Cymru am byth
here, there lieth
the boys and the men
the drowned and the bloated
for the silver and lead

Hiraeth
Hiraeth
Cymru am byth
for the silver and lead
bring out your dead
turning them over
for the silver and lead
count them
recount them
we walk on the blood
of the boys and the men
of the gone and the dead
bring out your dead
cast in silver and lead

Hiraeth
Hiraeth
in these stones lieth
pray, a moment of silence
let them sing, witness
the troubles they had
Gwlad, Gwlad, pleidiol wyf i’m gwlad

Hiraeth
Hiraeth
Cymru am byth

For dVerse Poetics this week, Dora invites us to consider stone our muse for our poetic wanderings, whether it be gemstones, vast rocks, or somewhere in-between.

Where I live in Wales, I am surrounded by quiet hills and mountains that once roared with industry, stretching back over two thousand years. Whether it was silver, lead, copper or gold, the people of this part of our country mined it – you can only imagine the dangerous conditions in which they worked.

I chose to give a voice to the people of the past who worked in terrible conditions to bring the minerals out of the very rock of this land, weaving in some of the Welsh language at the same time. I have included explanations of the words and phrases that I have used below:

Hiraeth – a deep longing for something, especially your home
Cymru am byth – Wales forever
Gwlad, Gwlad, pleidiol wyf i’m gwlad – Land! Land! I am true to my land! This is from the national anthem of Wales, Land of My Fathers.

If you would like to join us in writing a poem inspired by stones, precious or otherwise, click on the link above and join us!

(Photo of the Cwm Elan lead mine, from 28dayslater.co.uk).


Incendiary

freyathewriter 20 Comments 
I have nothing left
and so I am consumed
incendiary
for the mother whose fire is extinguished
for the father who is mere ashes
for the child

for the child

I protest
I have nothing left
you will burn with me
and you will listen

Tonight the dVerse Poets Pub is kindly hosted by Punam for Quadrille Monday, where she invites us to write a quadrille of 44 words on the them of ‘protest’.

I will let the poem speak for itself.

(Image credit: Michael Noel, via Pexels).

Yes, well…

freyathewriter Leave a comment

15 June 2020

… I haven’t been around.

You know that Buddhist term ‘monkey mind’?  An apt description for that mind that just can’t focus on one thing with any consistency?

You know that goldfish memory that, well, isn’t?

Can you imagine the two combined in some fishbowl-confined underwater jungle where the goldfish leaps over and under tree branches and the monkey runs around and around and around the belly of the bowl, scratching its head and gaping?

That’s me. Or rather, it’s a representation of the inner workings of my brain, and has been for a while. I like to think that I’m not alone. If I am, well I aim to remain in blissful ignorance because there’s enough to worry about at the moment, isn’t there?

BLACK LIVES MATTER

I am anti-racist. I am white. The tiny taster of horrific, brutal racism and the privilege that I have that means that in my daily life I never have to think about the colour of my skin has hit hard. It has forced me to truly take on board the fact that my experience of the past few weeks is as nothing when compared to what people of colour regularly have to deal with, in addition to the normal stresses and strains of every day life. Or the not so normal stresses and strains since CoViD-19 came knocking on the world’s door.

I don’t think that I am ignorant and have experienced enough direct ‘isms’ and ‘obias’ of my own over the past decades to refuse to accept hatred directed at other groups. Making the conscious decision to be anti-racist feels like a heavy, burdensome thing. But the burden is nowhere near as heavy as just letting racism continue, through being silent. I refuse to have that on my conscience.

On this matter, the Black Lives matter, my brain is focused. That monkey mind is more akin to one of those Japanese snow monkeys that bath in hot springs in Japan.

The goldfish? Forget about it.

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