Poetry – The Valley of Death

The Valley of Death

They all walked through the valley of death;

Through the hail of bullets,

Dodging the arbitrary blasts of missiles,

Evading the bombs,

Guided by the blind hand of luck,

Emerging the other side

Physically unscathed

Yet mortally wounded.

They all walked through the valley of death

And were killed

By the misses,

Each and every one!

Opher – 3.4.2022

Nobody come through war unscathed. It twists minds. It steals futures.

Nobody escapes the horrors.

The mental scars don’t show but they cut deeper. Life can never be the same. The trauma is corrosive.

Only the psychopaths are immune. They enjoy i! But they are victims before the first bullet is fired.

Nobody survives a war.

Poetry – Kill to Liberate

Kill to Liberate

We come to liberate!

                But our brothers hate us!

Sent to save them;

                They abuse and bait us!

It’s not a war –

                A military manoeuvre!

Ridding neo-Nazis

                Could have gone smoother.

Ungrateful people

                Don’t want saving.

Call us fascists.

                Say we’re enslaving.

We’ve had to bomb them.

                Kill them, rape them!

That will teach them!

                We’ll liberate them!

Opher – 31.3.2022

Putin told us that this was merely a military manoeuvre to liberate the Ukrainian people from neo-Nazis enslavement.

He rapidly discovered that the Ukrainian people did not want ‘liberating’, indeed they saw the Russians as enslavers. The resistance was ferocious. The ungrateful population took up arms and fought the invaders off.

The Russian superpower proved to be impotent. They were killed by the thousand. Their tanks and planes were destroyed. The war rapidly turned into a disaster.

Frustrated, the Russians took to long-distance destruction of Ukrainian cities, to deliberately targeting women and children, to raping and killing.

Kill to liberate.

Kill to liberate.

War crimes galore!

War has moved on!!

The Ukraine war has shown that war has moved on.

Planes, tanks and ships are obsolete. They can all be easily blown up with cheaper missiles.

We are now in the age of drones and missiles.

Putin has discovered that his planes, tanks and ships are highly vulnerable. It has become a lot harder to invade another country.

Troops can quickly deploy hand-held antitank missiles. Tanks, helicopters, planes and ships are sitting ducks.

A country does not need offensive weapons. It needs defensive weapons.

Does this make things better or worse?

If a country develops an infallible missile to take our nuclear ballistic missiles would that make things safer or more dangerous?

Would a country use first strike if they thought they could get away with it?

I think we’re in for a major arms race!! More money wasted!! Vast sums down the drain!! Utter madness!!

The Corona Diaries – Day 773

It was quite warm in the morning when I went for my walk. The wind got up in the afternoon though and made it feel a lot colder. Up my hill, the blossom and buds are coming out. A pair of kestrels flew over my head into the copse. I think we might be seeing some baby kestrels later in the year.

I was quite upset to hear that we’ve lost an estimated 40 million birds from the UK in the last fifty years – upset but not surprised. The loss of wildlife since my childhood is staggering. What used to be commonplace is now rare. So much has simply disappeared. Am I the only one left who cares?

I’ve been reading today and playing some Downliners Sect and Eels. Don Craine was buried today. That took me back to being all nostalgic for when I was fifteen. 1965. All hair, long sides, Cuban-heeled Chelsea boots, frayed out jeans, girls, parties and loud music. I was into Kinks, Stones, Who, Yardbirds, Pretty Things, Others, Undertakers and Downliners Sect. Good days. Perhaps I could have done a tad more school work?

Meanwhile, out in Coronaland, our leader is probably hiding in a fridge again. The Partygate scandal is too recent. The media just might ask him about lying and law-breaking. His usual tactic is avoidance. It all blows over! Incredible! Where is Sue Gray??? What about the rest of the MET fines??

I keep bumping into people who have just had Covid. The secret government policy of herd immunity is certainly working. Perhaps it would have been a good idea for Johnson to tell us all about it though? Just bringing it in blind is sneaky and risky. But then is it a Tory cunning scheme?? It’s the poor who get ill and die – the ones from deprived areas – and they predominantly vote Labour – are they trying to bump them off? Or are they trying to reduce the benefit payments? They did a good job of that dumping all the sick people back into the Care Homes in the early days of the pandemic!

Putin is certainly taking a bashing. They are picking his tanks off as they retreat from Kyiv.

The Russians have left behind a trail of misery – executions of civilians, torture, rape, looting and destruction. Schools and hospitals wrecked, housing blocks burnt out and traumatised people left in their wake.

A lot of the Russian soldiers were young kids who were conscripted in. They have been looting alcohol and getting drunk. Probably terrified out of their lives and traumatised for life. They’ve seen their friends shot and blown up and have taken it out on the Ukrainian people they’ve met. There are mass graves, dead tortured people with hands tied behind their back and tales of atrocities.

This is what war does. It’s an abomination for all concerned.

It’s cost trillions and wrecked lives. Putin has a lot to answer for. I hope he finds himself in a dock somewhere in the Haigh.

The short-term result is that it’s going to cost us all a lot of money. Oil, gas and food prices will shoot up. The long-term result is likely even worse. Our governments will use it as a lever to put up taxes, fund the military and produce an even nastier set of weapons.

We humans are not very good at solving poverty, at producing fair societies, at being tolerant and welcoming, but we can produce the most expensive, dastardly ways of killing each other. There’s always enough money for that! Prepare for a new generation of tanks, ships, missiles, planes and nuclear bombs.

We’re into an arms race with Russia, China and North Korea!! Yippeee!! Plenty money to be made for the wealthy!!

The Capitalist way!! We spend a fortune (and make huge amounts of money) destroying cities and killing people and then we spend a fortune (and make huge amounts of money) building them up again!

We are mad!!

So, now we have no testing for coronavirus we have to make guesses. They think that 1 in 7 people had it last week!! We’re at record levels despite the fact that the pandemic is officially over!! Big Dog Turd is saved!!

Lo and behold – when you stop testing the level goes down! Ony 69,689 new cases yesterday. But an increase of 1466 into hospitals and another 191 deaths!! Yipee!! It’s over!! (Didn’t Trump suggest doing away with testing?? – that was his ploy – to pretend it wasn’t happening?>?) Yep I think so!!)

Mind you, we have a new UK variant!! Perhaps it will be a really mild one? Or perhaps it’ll be the death bug?? Who knows? Mutation is random!

Stay Safe!!

Poetry – Forecast of War

Forecast of War

The government has issued a red alert.

The approaching storm is forecast to bring much devastation to the whole area.

It will start with a hail of incoming missiles, squalls of rockets, and gusts of smoke interspersed with light, patchy, infantry.

This will be followed by prolonged showers of shells along with localised bombing, accompanied by blasts of intense heat. There will be a loud droning and stratospheric vapour trails inducing intense periods of terror.

People are asked to stay under cover until the storm has passed and all tanks are empty. There is danger of falling masonry and low flying helicopters.

Shortly after the first onslaught, another front is forecast to charge through, bringing strong winds of disillusionment, a severe rise in blood pressure, with localised tornados of fear and horror, caused by drifts of corpses, leading to floods of tears.

Once the storm has passed it will leave heavy bursts of permanent trauma and emotional whirlwinds in its wake. The aftermath will entail dealing with much psychological debris and emotional damage.

There is concern among forecasters that these extreme events are merely the beginning of political climate change. The normal interchange of current affairs has been knocked off-kilter by large flurries of greed, lust and paranoia, leading to extensive frosty relations. They are concerned that we are heading for a new age where underlying trends are much hotter and more volatile.

Forecasters are presently studying the skies for any clouds of ballistic missiles which could herald a cataclysmic event likely to result in a permanent winter.

They remain hopeful that we can avert disaster through global cooperation and goodwill.

First, we must weather the storm. Stay safe. We are subject to forces beyond our control.

Opher 2.4.2022

This has to be read in the voice of a weather forecaster.

I’m not sure that it is a poem, as such. But then what is?

I was also not sure whether it was making too light of something that is so horrific.

Why are human beings so mindlessly nasty?

Can violence ever be an answer to anything? I’ll ask Will Self.

War is diabolical and all who practice it should be locked up! The damage it does to human minds is permanent. No wonder so much of human civilisation is such a mess. Most people are screwed up due to violence.

The victims become perpetrators.

Poetry – I Make War!!

I Make War!!

I fire bullets.

                I fire rockets.

                                I drop bombs.

                                                Lives in my pockets.

I plan wars.

                I give orders.

                                I send troops

                                                Across borders.

I kill children.

                I rape girls.

                                I destroy.

                                                The game unfurls.

I’m the leader,

                I make rules,

                                Setting targets

                                                For the fools.

I make love.

                I make law.

                                Power and greed.

                                                I make war!

Opher – 31.3.2022

Without the goons there would be no war. The tyrants make the rules and direct the troops. The mindless zombies carry out the wishes. They shoot, they rape and kill. The despots treat us like fools.

Poetry – We Have War

We Have War

We have love.

                We have art.

                                We have music,

Architecture,

                Literature

                                And dance.

We have war.

There’s the spirit.

                There’s the sea,

                                The sun

                                                And nature’s

                                                                Poetry.

There’s war.

We have life,

                Philosophy,

                                Wonder and awe,

                                                Guiding us

                                                                To what life’s for.

Then we have war.

Opher – 31.3.2022

Mankind is capable of great things yet while we have war it all counts for nothing.

There is violence, there is hatred and there is war.

War negates everything.

We build things up, nurture and create and war reduces it to nothing.

Death, rape, trauma and agony. War and violence is the greatest flaw in our nature. It feeds on greed and the lust for power.

Poetry – Putin’s Dust

Putin’s Dust

Bedding to ashes

                Houses to dust

Sure and certain

                Cities resurrected

Traumatised people

                Suffer eternally.

Pounded to rubble

                Killed to be saved

Liberators in khaki

                Dispensers’ of death

Following orders

                Mindless madness.

Committed to the ground

                Flesh to earth

Pulverised

                To pulp

Grandiose plans

                Paranoia and power.

Curtains to ashes

                Children to dust

Futures to earth

                Hope to rust!

Dreams dissolved

                Horrors unleashed.

Time does not heal!

                Time does not heal!

                                Time does not heal!

Time just moves on.

                It moves on

                                And takes the stains with it.

Opher – 31.3.2022

War traumatises all who come into contact with it. It traumatises. It breaks minds. It ruins lives

The jigsaw puzzles cannot be put back together.

Minds are broken, damaged.

There is a stain that lasts forever.

It damages the victors as much as the victims.

Putin will suffer.

Is this why we put psychopaths in charge? Because they have no feelings for the suffering they instigate?

Is this why we elect sociopaths because they enjoy inflicting pain?

Are these leaders human?

Do they not become disturbed by the death and suffering they unleash?

Cities are rebuilt but the stains remain.

People cannot be rebuilt. The survivors are often the unlucky ones.

Part of them is forever destroyed.

War.

Nothing can ever be normal again.

Putin living to regret what he has done?

Is Putin receiving misinformation?

Are all his close clique living in fear and feeding him what he wants to hear?

Will the sanctions hit the Russian economy?

How many dead Russian troops are there?

How many tanks, planes and vehicles have been blown up?

What will India and China do?

Has NATO some responsibility for this?

What about these Ukrainian neo-Nazi groups?

Will Putin ever end up in the Haigh to be tried for war crimes?

Will there be a regime change in Russia?

Will the Russian people eventually see through the propaganda Putin is spewing out?

Why is China spewing out that same pro-Russian propaganda?

When the body bags and stories all come back to Russia will the Russian people find the courage to rebel?

How long can the repression and oppression last in the face of death and severe austerity?

Why do the Russian people tolerate such gross inequality (Putin and Oligarchs have billions while most Russians live in poverty) (mind you, we do the same – just at a slightly higher level)?

Will Ukraine come back to bite Putin or will he go on to take over Ukraine and other countries?