I love the revelry of words sound
words as they ride and are formed
languishing momentarily or longer
on the back of the tongue
brought forward on the breath
to roll and reverberate in the vault
of the mouths vast darkness
to briefly rest on the tongues tip
a momentary and glorious savouring
and then to flit from the bit of my teeth
and freed then thrown outward
on the stuttering blast of breath
the sound of words the dissonant clash
and the smooth assonance
that always manages to awaken me.
Of words and truth.
Like grasses bundled
And withered in storm
We are blown helplessly
And not a word is spoken.
Who sings the authentic song?
Who speaks the words of truth?
Who stands for me and mine?
Who looks at what we see?
Who hears what we hear?
Who breathes the air we breathe?
Who sees what is right and wrong?
Who speaks for me and mine?
Who sings the authentic song?
Where are our heroes and poets now?
Rob Cullen
Its the time it takes
A time to heal the wound
This healing time
Fallen
Standing in silence
On the stone littered ridge
Surrounded by days
Bare edged morning
As black crows dive
Clustered close to curve
And stoop straight through
The treeless rush
A headlong scream
Launched from the headless hill.
The Black Box.
It’s been the first night
I’ve slept right through
In a month or more
I woke thinking
Of you and that black box
You used to keep
under your bed
and those messages
from the past it contained.
A few words written
On brown parcel paper
With the correct postage
Sent from Germany
In nineteen forty five
You wrote to your love
Breaking out tonight
Heading for American lines
But you ended up
With the Russians instead
And we laughed at that
So typical of our dad.
But there was that faded
Old telegram too
So fragile now
From where you’d
Handled it so often
Telling you your brother
Had died that morning.
He’d fought in the war
Just like you
And came home
To the austerity
Of a land on its knees
Not free from desease
And the virulency of TB
That defied the hope
Of that miracle
Drug penicillin.
People have forgotten
The fear contagion
Of disease could bring
My poor uncle
Visited his old home
And his family
In Ireland for that last time
Not knowing
That he carried
A death sentence
And passed the disease
to his younger brother
And to his own daughter
Then when it came
To having tests in school
Before inoculation
It was found that
I was immune
And I must have been
exposed to it too.
But luck showed its hand
And stood on my
Right shoulder.
As children we’d run
around the street
singing that old jingle
Who won the war
in nineteen forty four.
And my father
Would say quietly
You shouldn’t believe
In such lies
And that constant
Bragging of the greatness
Of the British Empire.
We fought in a war
But paid for it dearly
War is never something
To be bragged over.
Rob Cullen 18/05 2016.
An afternoon of planting
in the raised bed
and I started to return
to the house
Stopping to wash
The soil from my hands
In warm rainwater
Gathered in a tub.
I watched the earth
As fine as silt
Slowly drift through
The waters depth
I washed my hands
In the past
Hands covered
In red and grey clay
In that old wood shed
Of the pottery
Cold water kept to make
Terra sigillata.
On lies and lies.
A lie
Told
Never
To be withheld
A lie
So devastating
Lives changed
In ways
No person
Could anticipate
Expect
Or rationalise.
He prayed
To god
That one
His one
But over
Many years
Never
Receiving
An answer
He presumed
He was Jesus.
On the cross
Jesus
Cried aloud
“My God – Father
My God – Father
Why hast you
Forsaken me?”
And so war
Is waged
In the name
Of a father
Who remains
Silent
Impassive even
And the people ask
Father
Why allow
Such cruelty
If we are
True believers?
And the reply?
Silence.
Listen
To the “wise” men
Insist
God
Is on our side
Ordering
Young men
To destroy
In the name
Of the righteous.
Pitifully
It’s the same
On the other sides
“Wise” men
Order the young
To kill
In the name
Of a silent
God
The same god
Our father.
The old
Talk
To the young
Father
Son
Holy ghost
Silence
A Buddhist
Priest spoke to me
About standing
In Auschwitz
Overcome
By the reality
Of Man’s ability
To justify.
It’s juxtaposition
A belief
In irrationality
To justify
Inhumanity
Or is this
The fantasy
That we are somehow
Rationale beings?
As a species
Our father
Our God
Remains
Silent
Forever
We look
We search
For signs.
Silence
We look
We search
For signs
Silence
And still
You ask
Why does
Our Father
Ein Tad
Yahweh
God
Let such
Bad things
Happen?
Silence.
We look
For signs
We are rationale
There must be
Signs.
So now
The wise men
Do not mention
Our father
Our God
They speak
Of the rightness
Of the need
To assist
To help
To prevent
But not God.
War is
A necessity
To protect us
From the threat
God
Silence
Priests
The “wise”
Silent.
They walk
In their processions
To celebrate
The lives taken
The lives lost
And the slaughter
But the devastation
Of lives
Silence.
The loss
Of Love
The grieving
Of a life
Through
A life
Silence.
And so
The prayers
Are mouthed
The words
Of the hymnal
Sung aloud
And
Father
Our father
Is silent
Its rationale
To believe
In the irrational
The Emperor
Has no clothes.
Irrational
It does not
Apply.
You must believe
In the silence
of the invisible
Of the Father
Who cares
But
Doesn’t care
It’s irrational
To be rationale
Pray
Silence
Are we all
Gods?
Is God dead?
Silence.
Rob Cullen
This land that surrounds
This land that has nurtured us
For so long
This land on which we stand
This land has no voice
This land is silent
This land is silent
This land has stood
Witness for so long, so long.
But if we took time
To listen to this land
We would hear its voice
We would hear it in the wind
And the lowing of the trees
We would hear its voice
In the grasses sigh
We would hear the land
In the rush of the rivers
And trickling of streams
This land in its silence sighs
Let me rest
Let me breathe
Open your eyes and see
Let me rest
Let me breathe
Let me renew
Let me rest
Leave me to green
Leave me to grow
This land cannot hide
This land cannot run
This land cannot pretend
To be somewhere else
It cannot disguise its pain
And what of the guardians
What of the people of this land
Are their eyes blind-folded
So tight that they cannot see
Or perhaps they face the other way
Distracted and deafened
So that they no longer
Hear the cry of the land
Let me breathe
Let me rest
Let me renew.
Rob Cullen
Taking time
It’s the hardest
Thing to do
Just sitting
Listening
In that way
We used to
As the candles
Licked and flicked
And I’d watch
Your eyes
And the gleam
Of your smile
And that feeling
When I made you
Forget and laugh
And we’d watch
The waves.
Rob Cullen
Do you remember?
In the stairwell
Of the old house
At Netherfield
Red admirals
Gathered
And over wintered
And hung
Waiting for Spring
Then fluttering
At windows
To be let out
When that time
Had come
I hear you
Stretching
Your wings too
Aching to fly
And grow again
in the sun.
Rob Cullen
