thehighlanderspoems


Ashen Decay

We arose from the bunker
To a scene never seen
What was once green and vibrant
Ashen, no gleam

Below the church we stand
In staring appall
No sense we make of it
This deathly thrall

They did it, they went and did it
The buttons, they pressed
Mindless, crazy idiots
In their war mongering zest

Choking, spluttering we are
In confused look around
Shadows of where they were
Graffiti surround

Black shadows fly
Amidst the ashen decay
Carrion cravers they be
In flesh stripping array

Emaciated to thin
In skeletal walk, we
To where, we're not sure
In this land, we be

Radiated and stressed
As we peer to our sun
Decades in the dark, we'll be
Man's new era has begun
 

Eventuality, Befalls to Silence

Tapping fingers, pulse ~
The awaiting, ones sweating
Anticipating ~
Message received, codes now read
Slowly keys turn, silo's open ~




 

Civil War

This evening I listen to a Rock 'n' Roll band
Their track is Civil War, as our world now expands

To us it's the same size but to others they despise
For the want of greed exists in their killer hungry eyes

Where do I start, to say of their evil spread
A different starvation leaving the world in evil dread

It's not our today's but our yesterdays years
That our history tells us, of our everlasting torn tears

Cambodia, the Lebannon, and Sri Lanka's Indian sun
Rebels who demand better at the end of a gun

Guaetamala and Peru with their Shining Path
Villagers in terror decrying it's ever last

Democracy is our power in it's controllable exist
Like the Shining above, how long will our future paths persist

Recent news in the Arabic World, has taken tyrants by surprise
For decades they have stolen with their torturing infidel lies 

I could go deeper and deeper to describe these evils acts
In wanton blood spillage, to increase civil war torn facts

For this is the world we live in, it appears we determine to live
Maybe in our lifetime it will be on our doorstep, we open, our lives will sieve

 


Through Graphite Grey Surround

Graphite greys surround
The ancient in deathly stare
Horizon brings hope
A long forgotten orb peers
Through Nuclear fallout, she smiles
 

Average Age 19

Once again, the powers that must
In rise again in what we trust
An overseas conflict, another war
Just what in the hell are we fighting for

Families are asking, Korea has just passed
Generations again reft, how long will it last
A country in need, to rebuild again
Flags at half mast, in wind and rain strain

Once again into war, sent by the Washington Post
To send back reports to hit home the most
Military observers were the first to be sent in
Another chapter of man entering existing sin

I'm witnessing our ariel power, Lam Son 719
US planners determine their incursion, saying all will be fine
Along the Mekong River, we'll carpet bomb their supply trail
Tons of munitions and napalm, this spread surely cannot fail

Many sorties are being flown, for the wounded and the dead
Whilst Nixon and his cronies, aren't thinking with their heads
The news of losses has reached me, nineteen have been killed
Eleven missing, fifty nine wounded, more American blood spilled

Seven fixed wing aircraft, more sons in action loss
Whilst back at home more protests, fading the dyeing's gloss
To to this job that I do, I was never prepared for this
To witness such bloody scenes, and ignore that life is bliss

How can I write about a soldier, whose name I'll never know
Killed at nineteen years old, his family he'll never see grow
Or even explain to his parents, when carried from the AH-1
His body bullet riddled and limp, when lifted it bloodily run

I never went back to the theatre, called the Vietnam War
Having witnessed the wanton killing, what were we fighting for
This colonial conflict that started, us on the side of France
So many came back as strangers, many to live in a trance


The Nilands of Tonawanda

Siblings fight for peace
unknown horrors they now face
theatres of war
fallen, in recognition
we must save the surviving 








 

As we Await the Next

Another night of shelling another night in hell
To lie in stench filled trenches watching bodies swell
Seeing the grimace of death engraved on ones so young
From Utopia they were born, now I'm in among

I can't think how ludicrous it is to await the next
Seeing futures disappear, oh! how it leaves me vexed
Trenches, bolt holes and craters, filling with rotting flesh
Barbed wire like human snares, now a crimsoned mesh

My eyes in tears now close as I hear the dying cry
Whilst a solitary shot sounds out, invisible through the sky
This silent assassin awaits their unsuspecting foe
For through a lapse in theatre, another life will slow

The evening I dreaded is upon us, this is no fireworks display
It's another sign of man, and their self destruction play
Many hours ahead now await in this shell shattered surround
How many of us will still be standing, or swallowed by the ground

The above is all I can remember from those days from a war torn past
I'm so fortunate to recall so little, whilst many colleagues cast
I've lived a life of years, so many more than them
What or who decided to chose from these heroic fighting men 


We Came Upon A Clearing

We came upon a clearing as we all started to choke
Our eyes hurting, painful, us soldier serving blokes

Pieces of black floated, sporadic burning embers passed
Hazed buildings we could see through the trees, chimneys a fast

A stench captured our senses, nothing like this war has before
As we progressed through this something, my heart skips to sore

Beyond the barbed wire fences, deadening cries filter all around
And then I see skeletal beings, it's they who make those sounds

Emaciated to thin, I've killed men before my eyes
Women, men, and children so young, it's like watching the walking die

Through the gates we go, human carcasses piled so high
The hardened in us tremble, and many of us start to cry

The strong that we meet, hold our hands and welcome us so
Leading us into some buildings, we entered, they wouldn't go

On entering we now understand, their unwillingness to follow we
It beggars belief, mans inhumanity to man, that allows this kin to grieve

Furnaces still roaring, burning bodies consumed by their heat
Do I image they were alive or dead to meet this ghastly greet

We enter another building, witnessing piles of shoes and suitcases
I've seen many a sight in this war, but never a sight such as this

The strength of me now exhausted, in wretch I'm sickened to disgust
It's plain and clear, so evident that I've witnessed murdering lust

To the air I wanting go, for their memory I'll never forget
And for the rumours that these places existed, for some will they regret


In Life We Roam

We find ourselves cowering from their RPG's
Grown fighting men being brought to their knees

Kandahar is where we are so many miles from our homes
Trying to keep focused but inside we steadily roam

Incessantly we hear the zipping of bulleted lead
Invisible to the eye, for they can bring us near to dead

A silence suddenly falls amidst clouds of ashen grey
As we suffer a direct hit, modern man finally plays

In my peripheral I hear a scream, that I've never heard before
Then I hear a pleading by weaponry in maiming score

Upon the dust lifting, I view a blood stained earth
Limbless my colleague is, is what we're fighting worth

He's nineteen years old, so many miles from his home
His body torn and burnt, where does his mind now roam

"Medics, medics" now deafen the surrounding screams
Shell shocked we are, grown fighting men beside crimson streams

Our tour of duty is now over, us fortunate return to our kin
As we remember he, our fallen, and their roaming in us within


Peer Pressure of the Worst

Peer pressure of the worst no matter who they are
They can be a boy or girl that they believe to become martyr's

Strapped to these young souls, is something they just don't understand
Yet the cowards who persuade them to miss, becoming a woman or a man

What, where, why or when, does this quest justify it's means
For it arises in the warped depraved, in twisted confused dreams

For in this book that they all crave about, this they cannot do
It's against their religion to request the suicide of you

For all their Cleric's whom they are, they sit and witness so
Not one has ever spoken out, to stop this exploding blow

Why is this I ask myself, for they fear the bullet of a gun
Because it's easier to suppress their young, terrorism has again begun

 

Plockton - Wester Ross

The greatest holiday gift I ever received  
Goes back so many, many years
Before my life became turmoiled
And before my tears for fears

I was a child like many out there
Torn, strewn and split of kin
Mother and father in differences
Confused at seven, wearing their same skin

For I was one of the lucky ones
To a Highland Estate I would go
It's on the west coast of Scotland
Where my holidays desired me so

Secretly I internally smiled
For a whisper of where I was heading
To live with a movie star hero
No longer my life was in dreading

We were picked up by a man so fine
His manners were an absolute joy
Regimental he was in his approach
To me, just a seven year old boy

We travelled through the village of Plockton
Crystal clear waters edged to it's shore
I knew from this very moment
Being here ebbed previous family sores

On entering his house I was in awe
Movie pictures came to my view
They were images of James Bond
At seven I was totally through

A voice called to me
Hey James! sit down and I'll tell you me
Still in circles in walking awe
This is what he told thee

My name is Patrick Dalzel Job
In the Second World War I served
But this recognition I bestow
Humbles me to it's deserve

This honour that's been given
Was blessed by a colleague in war
What desired Ian Fleming to be so striven
Possibly, what we were fighting for

We served on the same destroyer
Fighting to make the future free
His tribute, in his novels I became
James Bond, it's incredibly me


Not many seven year old's have stayed with James Bond.
This seven year old Scot's boy has, maybe I learnt?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Dalzel-Job