THE FOLLOWING POEM WAS SELECTED IN WINGWORD POETRY PRIZE 2023 LONGLIST.
Soaring above it, you can see sculptures
Of white marble and grey stone,
Built as brutally as they come,
Crammed together with a thumb's
space left free in between some,
Each block a grave,
Each grave a house,
As we fly over the boundless
Cemetery for living souls.
The inhabitants scurry about,
like ants in a labyrinth -
knowing exactly where to go,
since along their paths they go,
since ages long ago,
again, and again, and again,
each voice muddled up into
the overall humdrum that makes up
a civilization of monotony:
"Any voice that stands out must be quelled
or returned to the normal tone,
for without order there is no peace,
and without peace...".
Automation takes the hand of each person,
each person like a cog in a machine;
perfection is impossible,
so why try to be perfect?
Just follow the routine,
and let the machine perpetuate itself:
A strict hierarchy at the top of which lies its bottom
presides over this yard of graves.
This city does not breathe;
this civilization's heart has stilled -
these creatures live as if killed,
for they obey not their own will,
but that of another.
A tale is told of a man,
who escaped the system and ran
away from the tedium to a land
of green grass and amber skies -
a land of dreams, in dreams,
a place in his mind,
for that was the one thing,
the one element of his living soul,
that they could never cage.
If ever there was a way out of this mess,
some way to emancipate the individual,
to rise out of the grave and into freedom,
to fly high into those amber heavens made real,
to ask the future to lend its gentle hand,
so that we may join it in its mirthful conquest,
this was the way.
The rest of them opened their eyes,
saw their potential,
and here's an uprise,
that startles aristocracy awhile;
but there was fear in their eyes,
fear of failure and punishment,
and so, by the cause of fear of failure,
they failed to liberate themselves.
Only if they'd open their minds,
instead of clutching their fists,
they'd break open those stones,
escape from the labyrinth of crypts
and rejoice in their newfound peace,
a peace with order, not control.
Oh, what a glory they envision!
They do compare it to a summer's day,
Just being verdant with more sun-rays.
Life's bustle shakes the darling buds of May
But summer's lease has not too long a phase.
Sometime too hot the eye of power shines,
too often is its bold commandment dimm'd.
Yet every rule from rule slowly declines,
By chance or nature's changing course it's thinn'd.
But their imagin'd summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that hope they keep
Nor shall corruption to them be a shade;
Ne'er in fanatic lines to death they'd creep
So long as mankind sees and fear's at bay,
So long lives faith, and faith gives life to them.