Poetry is the language of

love and longing

the listening ear

of words

 eyes painting pictures

of our worlds

of creatures great and small

I want to be

not separate from anything living

standing on this earth.

Yet I hold a heavy heart

as we plunge this world

into darkness.

The war machine keeps turning/churning

in profit and greed

the fickle manner the laws change

pitting some groups against others

I don’t understand

this thinking -

that vilifies protesters who

come in peace

refugees who escape war, famine

loss of land/ stolen

stolen!

the words dry up

in the confusion and complexity

of a mechanical world

where remote-control bombing

create such bloody havoc on the ground.

There is nothing poetic about genocide

Nothing!

and yet there are poets who

continue to live amongst the

rubble and dust of a city

devastated by war

let me salute the poet Shahd Alnaami

poet, writer of stories who will not allow

the children, people of Gaza to be forgotten.

 so we lift up head and heart

to walk together in solidarity

finding another way

an alternative route.

By Kim Ward