Thursday, July 26, 2018

Stolen


the secret music of the children tears my flesh
spirit journeys of a newer time unknown
in dreams all empty nights long
darkness
without pity
the lost children
the ones whose poetry is untried
 bare limbs torn from mothers
torn from homes and lives
torn from the breasts of those
who only wanted to give them more and better
the abject tortured poems cried in the dark
innocent/not innocent
             Terror

the death of journeys
death of hope
the echoes of the heart
the deepest memories
the never
never
never
our land forgotten
left behind with older dreams
with Nothing but barren fields
empty streets and tumbling cots
wizened shrunken faces
of the ancient ones
sprung from the soil
roots deep in a place called Home

haunted sleepless obscured night skies
stars lost in lowering bleakness
no moon to give us back
the songs we left that place with
and disembodied footfalls
loud voices
words not understood
and then the tearing and the screams
and then the blackness falls all round
the soundless dreams crushed together
with no language
driven
beaten
raped and broken on the lathe of hell
the horror of those moments
when we believed the good
the open loving arms
arms now tearing
demanding
no whispered loving sounds
but taunts and hideous laughter
as force gives up no names
no identities
no longer innocent
nightmares without names or faces
the screams filling all orifices
leaving no room for light
the holes left in bodies
psyches
spirits
deep wells bottomless
in the night of cries and evil almost-whispers
like grinding gears or ripping clothes
deadly whispers calling ugly names
and putting hands where hands should never be
soft untouched skin
deep gravid eyes
wounded with forgetting
wounded with the need for oblivion

what will become of these children
calling out their agonized refrains
in the deepest time of night
where dreams go to die
the promised borning burning
torched by invective
the delicate skin
the trembling flesh
words ripped from center
by naked claws
ever since the mother was torn away

where is the mother, the father
where?
do they not love me ever any more
why don’t they come
where is that lullaby
that song that let me sleep at last
why did they go and leave me here?
with just this crying
endless crying
words are told to me but all is din
discord
voices layered and overlapping
hard hands and harsh impatient touch
names lost
exchanged for numbers

I, in safety
hear
and plead for torture to stop
there is no remedy, no sanctuary
and the poetry of children tears my soul
I am complicit
my age will not forgive me
I am not forgiven
tears fall and mingle
with rivers and lakes of laments
unceasing streams
weeping for what’s been taken
there’s no giving back
it’s gone
fragile lives melt into other lives  
and older times
forgotten times
the young hatched from these caged birds
know no sacred touch
no love
can words half remembered
buried deep within the memories of long ago
when mother held them
her soothing bell-like voice
sang sweet unworded nothings
into tiny shell-like ears
the promises
lost promises given
can forgotten words still heal?

we can only give them poetry
and broken promises
but maybe poetry will be enough


© 2018 pamela twining