9 : Hunger
Across the long years
Most falls away forgotten.
Only a few fragments of song
On the scented wind,
A few stinging scars, tight and bitter,
Too highly regarded, dog-ends
Of disastrous choices,
Fit meat only for tales
Not for policies, not for futures.
Where there is gold:
There the cold-eyed, sly-smiled gather.
Where there is strife:
The carrion-eaters swoop in.
The hoodie cries
(Pecking at the eyes and brains of lambs),
Give us our freedom.
Too long have we been hunted,
Hung slack and bloody on barbed wire.
The martens cry
(As they bury into the bellies
Of the flock),
Give us our independence
To feed where we will
The endless, remorseless hunger
That comes summer or winter,
At ice-melt and frost fall.
The wily foxes circle,
Scenting an opportunity of gold,
Warm red crunch
In the dark hay loft.
To be left at peace
To be unhindered and honest,
Not to be slighted nor chivied,
Herded and diminished,
Nor subjected to the slow death
Of parasites,
Their cunning confusions,
Tongues of deceit,
Gold-grabbing fingers.
The freedom to belong
Is born with your each new breath,
Not with long lines of bloodshed,
Not with boundary stones.
Only when the bones crumble,
Where the fat feeds the soil
When the breath sighs, mingling
With the sedges on the loch-side,
Do we wholly belong.
Those who stand here,
And those who have died here:
They have the right to belong,
Like old MacLeod belongs,
Named and pinned under heaven
Until Time wipes even
The slumbering mountain away.
The ocean river squeezed through Sleat,
Fast, eternal,
At last leapt by stone.
The distant shore, desolate, silent
Hands reaching, never meeting.
Where you make your centre
Is where you are.
Where you belong
Your heart alone knows.
There is no language worth speaking
If it is not in kindness.
That it moves, whether fast or slow,
Voice and song
Are our only gifts to the universe.
We are not adversaries who struggle
For small freedoms, for the upper hand.
There is too much to be lost,
There is not enough to go around,
Never a second chance
When the wolves make the choices
Of who and when and where
A sacrifice is required.
From what will you escape?
What fiscal policy,
What redistribution of wealth,
Will free a pinched, aching heart
Filled with fear and debris,
The slurry of history,
The failures of others.
I have tasted a whisky in the hills,
Honey warm and smooth,
That in the city burned black and harsh…..
simonhlilly 
such powerful centering you provide…
Where you make your centre
Is where you are.
Where you belong
Your heart alone knows.
Thanks, againThought, linear thought, ceases
As time ceases.
Identity of self
Ceases
Story ceases
Focus ceases.
Human ceases
But
Perhaps not
Awareness
Perhaps not
Amusement.
Centre
Becomes circumference
Ever expanding
Or eternal
A flower
Blooming
On a prairie
Containing galaxies.
Time
Being nothing
But a measure
Of space.
Space,
The time it takes
Between edge
. It seems to be continuing to get darker, whilst seeking some light. Though I refer back to the historical, it seems the patterns reflect into the contemporary world events. ( it should be no surprise, I suppose, that this endless cycle is endless. But it does make one wish for an escape if not a slightly more permanent solution….)
This is rather bizarre, though just a slip of hand. A copy of a comment I posted earlier has just inserted itself here! Not wholly irrelevant, perhaps. Sometimes feel this electric screen pool is just an oracular gate the deep mind is newly delighting in!
i am lucky to have several places where i am always home and welcomed. but that’s not quite the same as truly belonging. i have a landscape in my heart, though, and a certain taste to the air and a soft accent. i’ll get there eventually.
This is certainly an amazing piece of work!
Not having much knowledge or expertise in the art of poetry, I’m not sure if this work could be considered “epic” poetry. It certainly is of epic proportions.
Do you plan to present it in its entirety, all the parts assembled together in a single post or other form of publication?
I would like to have it in my library and would certainly be willing to purchase it if it were published in hard copy or as an eBook.
epic indeed.
and I want to add, I have witnessed how an act of “redistribution of wealth” can free a pinched, aching heart — there exist true gift-givers thankfully. The witnessing was also a gift to me and freed my heart, if only for a moment.
Well, I agree a true redistribution of wealth would be a compassionate and surprising blessing. Problem is the promise of it, so far as I know, has never been matched by the execution ( tending towards, instead, another form of execution)!
Only when the bones crumble,
Where the fat feeds the soil
When the breath sighs, mingling
With the sedges on the loch-side,
Do we wholly belong.
Sigh, that is lovely…
Thank you! Always amazed where this stuff comes from sometimes….
amazing work. thankyou Simon x
Thank you, Sally