A Poem

This was a second poem read at Ferens that people asked for - not in the Sharp Street book. This one came to me at Durham Cathedral recently. I saw a Pieta in the Cathedral and pondered as to what women who had lost theirsons would have thought ...

Pieta

If we could have been there
followed the battle, cleaned up
the mess; we could have held you
in our own pieta, made sense
of that telegram held at the door
as if read. Now, there are visits
to the fields on charabancs
with picnics and photographs
but all I take from these slabs
on mown grass is the hum of bees.

None of the pointless blood letting
of the battlefield, the deeper wounds
of those left behind. Something
understood unleashed itself
at the door. I didn’t need to go
or even have those photographs
on the mantlepiece. We are both
gone. Now we are back as you and me.

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