Hidden Eclipse

Disappointment crawled inside us like some small creature trapped within the crevice of a rock. We stood, faces upturned into the darkening sky in small hope of witnessing the ellipsis of eclipse. But the clouds had come to obscure that moment. That moment of totality, swathed in a leaden, unbroken eiderdown of grey. 

The eclipse arrived on time, total, in its estimation, and strangely, otherworldly, the sky fell into darkness, and we observed the eclipse, a once-in-a-lifetime-experience; but without a glimpse of the paso doble of two perfect spheres.

My children stood with me and gazed up expectantly as the skies dimmed to midnight at noon; the summer air grew chill and birds panicked and squawked into the trees in their confusion.

There were no other optics except a sky the colour of a dead television channel. It was all over in minutes, no checkerboard tree effects, no spectacle for our eyes to avoid, no pinhole camera projections. Just a sense of anti-climax, a total eclipse of expectations, and a corona of speculation. We watched an invisible eclipse, a drama hidden behind grey curtains.

Steve Wheeler © 28 January, 2022

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Rich Pickings

There’s folk worse off than us, by far 

Worse off, worse off than us, by far 

Pass another drink across the bar 

There’s people worse off, by far

There’s people in dire straits they say 

Dire straits they say, dire straits they say 

I’ll sail my yacht across the bay 

There’s folk in trouble they say

There’s people with no food to eat 

No food to eat, no food to eat 

There are no food banks down our street 

There’s people with no food to eat

There’s folk who can’t afford their rent 

Can’t pay their rent, can’t pay their rent 

This mansion’s my main residence 

There’s people who can’t pay rent

There’s kids who have no shoes to wear 

No shoes to wear, no shoes to wear 

My Rolex watch shows wear and tear 

There’s no shoes for their kids to wear

There’s poverty in the neighbourhood 

And poverty ain’t particularly good 

It’s not good press and it sours the mood 

There’s poor folk in the neighbourhood 

Yes, there’s poverty in the neighbourhood

Steve Wheeler © 24 January, 2022

Photo by Steve Wheeler

Tramadol Dreams

After-images glare 

Red orange outlines flare 

Strange hallucinations rare 

Floating off to everywhere 

Nothing what it seems 

In hazy tramadol dreams

Spaced out in yellow sky 

Earth breathes a peaceful sigh 

Pain flees like a butterfly 

Live forever, never die 

Riding on a laser beam 

In vivid tramadol dreams

Steve Wheeler © 15 January, 2022

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Star of Mons

Nineteen-fourteen, the battle for Mons 

First mass offensive on a foreign shore 

Two tribal gatherings, juxtaposed 

Intent upon the brutal art of war

My grandfather, still a young man 

I see him now, astride that gelding horse 

Above the thundering hooves that lifted soil 

He galloped hard across the burning gorse

I see him now, upon that desperate ride 

Important message clutched within his hand, 

Racing down the lethal lines of fire, 

A signal delivered to the high command

Then back, returning down that torrid line 

With guns and rifles blazing all around 

Dodging the shrapnel and the mortal fire 

Deafened by the conflagration sound

Mentioned in dispatches for his deeds 

His courageous act above the call, beyond 

Although grandfather bravely soldiered on 

He never made it to the river Somme

Steve Wheeler © 11 November, 2021

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I am thinking of our glorious past

I am thinking of our glorious past 

with heart ablaze and tears that last. 

My mind dwells on the fields of gold and green, 

still virgin in the budding, nascent spring. 

I contemplate the memories of the glories past; 

now faint and faded, almost gone. 

Sienna photos, framed in sepia tones 

a century of dust has landed on.

I am thinking of my grandfather, 

who marched with others clothed in green, 

to Passchendaele, the Somme, Verdun, 

their buttons glinting brassy, in the morning sun.

I hear the clatter of the horses bridles, 

and the boys together, marching from the fields and colliery; 

The jokes and coarse humour, the nervous laughter; 

Young men forged together in their camaraderie.

I am thinking of our glorious past, 

the Empire in its great majestic might, 

feeding young lives, systematically and sure 

as raw meat and sinew, bone and blood 

into the ravenous jaws of the machine of war.

Steve Wheeler © 9 November, 2021

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Over the top

Midnight,

yet the sky is white

hot with tracers and

shell bursts through the night.

We shiver, we cower

in a long dirt bower

as the after burn sears

our brains and the noise

rattles our bones

to stokes our fears.

We are cold.

We are hungry.

The King’s shilling

has no value here.

We crouch on duckboards,

knee deep in the slurry

and the mire,

that sucks constantly

at our sodden boots.

Below us, a poisoned

quagmire, stinking

with effluent; and above,

a more lethal concoction,

A world of screaming metal

and molten lead.

A scream.

A curse.

Sudden, the mud and earth

rise beneath our feet

as the wooden rampart

shatter and falls,

we find our feet again and

listen to the wounded calls

for help, for mother, for God.

Just as suddenly, the noise abates,

into a cold black silence....

....and then the whistle.

that dreaded whistle blows, repeated and repeated

along the dark lines

relayed into the blackness.

The signal of what is soon to come.

The metallic clink as

the bayonets are turned

onto cold iron, and our

hearts are turned to ice.

And then we are up

and over the top.....

We are over.

Steve Wheeler © 8 November, 2021

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Requiem

The madness of battle,

rapacious roar of conflict,

terrible in its bitterness and bite,

a feral snarl of discord.

Oh, the voracious appetite

of war; its implacable

ability to destroy, to utterly

obliterate each new generation!

A manmade hell; the falling shell.

Young hearts pound in fear;

young blood courses down into

red raw soil of the field,

drenching the world with

anguish and blind torment.

And still, into the fight

the soldiers march, encumbered by

authority, led by their own

valour, weighted down by

history, bedecked with the

future glories of gross futility. 

We shall remember them, we

shall weep for them and we

shall celebrate their sacrifice,

when each last post is called and

each last flag is lowered. 

But, as our memories fade

who shall, in their turn 

our own memories preserve?

Steve Wheeler © 3 November, 2021

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