Poems
All loose
From the sap flow
Nourishment.
All ground dwelling
And russet blush:
Egg speckled,
Wrinkle-rind
And pith withered.
All in sepia age
And near translucency,
The fading fruit
Engorged
By the swallowing ground.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
Birds
Wet wing above
The scrub and stick
Of winter shrub
And leafless tree
Surfing
The rush and gust
And invisible bluffs
Warping sky’s
Endless grey.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
As you drove away
You looked over your shoulder
And smiled
And though there were ten steps
Of tarmac and the screen
Between us
I felt loved
And took your warm gift
As if you’d put it securely
In the palm of my hand.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
Somewhere in it
There is a buried truth
But we
Who blunder through
Find our free words
Banned and restricted,
A gag
Stuffed in the mouth
As if the messenger words
Were the evil
Rather than sentiment
Expressed
Or held in prohibition’s worse
And inward secrecy.
There is much merit
In an ideal
But not one forced,
And not one
Policed by strong arm law
Of uncertain thought
In stance
And put upon the voice,
That makes us speak
With a stuttery tongue,
Unsure of what can
And can’t be said.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
From the ragged beauty
Of the season,
Genetics speculate
A hope
In rose flower,
Half crippled,
Half pert lip
Of summer love,
Sent to test
The possibility
Of love’s emergence
And early awakening
To the surge of imminent spring.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
Last years
Sodden relic
Browns in decrepitude
And skeletal memory.
Next years
Tightly packed,
Protected shoot
Waits in green expectancy.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice
The mind
Tantalised by terror’s
Excitement,
Rubber stamps
Every violence,
Every incident,
And brands
Every normal madness
As terrorism
Born to our physical place.
And to the runaway dream
We add our angers,
And we rage
To do something against
The foe
Clothed
And created,
The anti image
Of our own
Disassociated face:
A glad enemy
Summoned
For us to fight.
And so we go
Hot headed,
The blood
Of foes
Desperate
To be let,
Our minds coalesced
In agreement’s
Blind conditioning
To go
Triumphant
And enthusiastic
To the next
Terrible war
Of mistakes.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice, 2015
If religion were expunged
Our ripe blood hearts
And fanatical brains
Would conjure
The sword wet
Dichotomy
Of feuding
Once more
And once again,
And we’d war
For sake of differing
And march
Beneath some other
Banner, flag
Or hot thought
Incendiary
In its desire
To strike out
And baptise
New recruits
In the endless
Cycle of violence.
© Ben Truesdale and distilledvoice
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