When I was Young
Poem. By Randall Stephen Hall
When I was young
The Belfast hills cupped our ears
To the sound of the gun.
We rattled like milk bottles.
We shook to the battle of bin lids
On concrete, but only on TV.
Foreign feet in tough toe caps
Arrived amongst us, only taking orders
From those hoarding money
For a rainy day book of memories
And a media retirement from the cameras.
Not convinced they ever did any good.
They were right to have these regrets
And broken sleep.
In the woods the “freedom fighters”
Buried weapons and Semtex
Like bog bodies.
Attracted to this lifestyle.
Groomed by older men
In the shadowy corners
Of bars and down alleyways
Where broken glass
And eggshells still share company
With illiterate graffiti.
“I know yer dah and we know
Where youse live, like . . .”
Like, like what?
An indication of how
The rot in our education
Let the least of us
Who needed it most.
Let them down
And continues to do so.
Today.
I remain to bury my words
Like weapons, deep in the woods
On Facebook, where no one
Will ever trip
On these barbed wires.
Yet, hope keeps me company
Like a dog shaped cloud
Sniffing at the moon.
Randall Stephen Hall
is a northern Irish artist.
The ‘freedom.fighters” that Randall disdains, are the ones who answered, in their own language those “hoarding money” and raiding our hones and killing our children with SLRs and plastic bullets while stomping on our dreams in “foreign feet in tough toe caps”.
Or as Tom Barry put it, “They said I was ruthless, daring, savage, blood thirsty, even heartless. The clergy called me and my comrades murderers; but the British were met with their own weapons. They had gone in the mire to destroy us and our nation and down after them we had to go”.
Freedom in quotations sneer,
But we’ll respect what we hold dear.
It seems Ye haven’t learned at all,
Randall Stephen Orange Hall.
Well stated, and in rhyme as well.
You’re a rebel true, I can tell.
Well stated, and in rhyme as well.
You’re a rebel true, I can tell.n
The Muse inspiring RS Hall
A Clone of Genius Suite Eff All?