Poetry and Creative Writing for All

Paul Willis

	Paul Willis won our Top 5 Poems of the Month Online Competition - May 2006

Late 1940

How innocent is innocence?

Shrapnel is such a beautiful word
When you're ten turning over debris
In search of the ultimate prize.
Terrace homes once uniformed in English pride
Now united in uniform grief.
Their broken windows rip flapping curtains
And smouldering mounds of red brick rubble
Hide bombs, bullets and bodies.

Shrapnel is such a beautiful word
When you're ten turning over debris.

How innocent is innocence?

London's burning under the enemy's iron will,
White heat from the incendiaries of hell
And all the while,
We played beneath the black cloud of bombers
Oblivious to the roar and wheeze of their mechanical power.
Spitfire,
Beautiful, sleek and stylish
Unlike your cousin the Hurricane,
Dog eared ruffian of the skies
Fill you full of lead and spit in your eye.

Winston awoke from his dream
And watched the shadows on the wall.
Contemplating he silently prepared
A speech of power, panache and wit
Gift them a smile while they ponder the hardest truth.

How innocent is innocence?

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1939

Intrigued,
He lifted the file from her desk,
The file she had on him.
The image she wore burned in his mind,
Raven hair, white blouse
Grey professional dress.
If they knew?
If they could see?
How could they unless…
His sweaty hands opened the file
Then with wide eyes he read.
Cold feelings spread,
His nerve cracked like breaking ice.
He only heard a click from behind
And not the trembling finger squeeze the trigger
Or the name she whispered with venom,
'Jew.'

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Shelter

Years before I had kissed her here
On this very spot
And as the rain started to ease
I remembered so many things.
Looking up at the sky
I left my shelter,
It was a huge chestnut tree
That glistened in the rain.
Westward,
Huge cracks in the broken clouds
Let through a large violent sunset.
Straight ahead the sky was dark slate
Untouched by the fire that melted the sky.
Every blade of grass and tree
Dripped with rain
And the road I travelled on,
Shone like a river.
The last drops of rain
Fell like gentle reminders.

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Withdrawal

Cold clammy skin,
The dead chill from freezing sweat
Slithers down her back like a slug.
Stomach pains,
Rip relentlessly inside like a blunted knife.
Veins that once pumped healthy blood
Are now shrivelled fragments of life.
She used to be pretty,
Blue eyes so bright and a face alive with smiles.
Her laughter once drifted through the house
Like a scented breeze,
But she now lays in her own vomit,
Drowning on the dreams, of her very first high.

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Remembrance Rain

From the billowing ocean of clouds,
Dark slate, battleship grey,
Falls remembrance rain
And when it forms
Tiny delicate drops
It glistens in silence.
From chaos and darkness
Such a long way to fall,
Touching the fields of Flanders
Memorial statues and legion halls.
Rain weaves a weary path
Down the soldiers ageing face,
Leaving behind a thinly disguised veil
Of transparent skin.
Poppies never looked so crimson
Laying amongst the backdrop
Of grey coats, clouds, coughs, old men…

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Submission Guidelines: Poems of no more than 30 lines in length each will be considered.