War Diary Part 1

I kept a verse diary for the build up and first few weeks of the invasion of Iraq. Here it is- four years on.

WAR DIARY

 PRELUDE

1

That was a pretty sorry winter.

Our bestest friend (now what was her name?)

Accused us of doing something atrocious

And broke off relations- Snap- like that.

And Ailz and I went looking for solace

On e-Bay.

               What I bought was  women-

28 millimetres high-

In halter tops with great big enormous

Axes and swords- (you see, where they come from

No-one gets cold) and I’ll paint em up

And they’ll be my army.

                                    Maybe I’ll get them

Some skeleton soldiers to smack around.

Crack those marrowbones

Knock those blocks off

Stamp on their nasty twiggy toes.

Today is February the twelfth.

And the cold air meeting the warm ground

Or the warm air meeting the cold ground-

Whichever- has turned the street to mist

As in my foggy London childhood.

Winter’s over at last I think

And I pick out the sodden rocket-stick

That’s been in the hedge since November the Fifth

And swish it around like a sword till it breaks.

( Read more... )

War Diary Part 2

DIARY

 

1

I don’t suppose it’s any surprise

To have it confirmed that the world is run

By the men of war.

 

                             It’s one of those dusty

Early spring days just before the leaves open.

Sat on the grass in a Manchester square,

I think how the sunshiny glass and the frosty

Plumes of the fountains were brought to us

Courtesy of the IRA

And their very big bomb.

 

                                      You kick a city

To bits and then it grows back again

Better. As Baghdad will. And the dead

Who are not dead yet as I write but will be

Dead by the time I come to revise,

Will have their monuments-

                                     

                                      Better ones

Than Saddam’s victory arch with the outsize

Scimitars clutched in muscly arms.

 

I feel so helpless.

 

                             I’ll spend this war

Constructing a habitat for nymphs.

The nymphs are tiny and made of white metal

And wear no clothes. They have weapons though,

Scimitars and spears and bows

To defend their trees which I’ll make from twigs

And their lake which I’ll make from kitchen foil.

( Read more... )

War Diary Part 3

8

Beer and dole and Blockbuster rentals

That’s why young men join the army-

To free themselves from  the squalid circle

Of beer and dole and Blockbuster rentals

( Read more... )

War Diary 4

13

Saddam Hussein -well it could be a double-

Goes for a toddle around Baghdad.

Tariq Azziz is answering questions.

He looks like he’s talking in his sleep.

These guys may be foul- but they’re all so old.

 

The future government of Iraq

Will be the same one,  Azziz explains

And just as he says it the lights go out.

 

Power-cut.

( Read more... )