The Shout

 

     It has been long in the heart but -

never really noticed in the eye,

  it has been a life long courtship that persists

    it stays silent, quiet, unsaid and unrecognizable,

      like a child you employ to do house cleaning on estates;-

        ‘every misunderstood wound has one, and all

          are misunderstood wounds in Manchester -

             should ever a convention take place!’

 

     But we pay them and so too the neighbour -

  and neighbour and neighbour so we’re all okay,

    our wounds are tended by those yet to have

       their heart cut and tortured, plastered and -

          bound over to keep the peace between pain

             and the vocal urge to scream;

               “Why Am I, Why Are We Hurting So Bad?”

 

     Before we recognized how long the canines

  had become as our rulers flashed a grin,

    did we ever give a thought to a Sunday roast or

       a sweaty kebab we would eat in the morning when

                 sober but;-

                   ‘sober is a word closely associated to wounds we are,

                      it is unsaid and recognizable and,

                              too boring?’

 

     Our rulers are so proud now,

they keep vigil to ensure the ghetto bird performs

  an ingredient to make manchester;- Manchester,

     to keep the wounds quietly bleeding yet never

         once speaking, or talking, or nodding -

            one another’s breath of placky drummy -

                white lightning cider or, skunk.

 

     I guess it is okay to die Ian,

   as we all do every end of day,

       it is okay to die yet how rude of they

          to wake us with light beam from a heli-born

             vehicle of ignorance as if,

                 civilian modes empathize the phospherous bombs

                      targeting civilians of the Middle East;-

                           ‘not yet the wounds and breath we are………

                                ……….. (but, worse)???’

 

      They said you had gone missing back then,

that you were last seen on a bridge and had, vanished,

  maybe they hung you for going missing,

              for;-

                ‘a wound, going missing without our knowledge or accountability??’

 

     We don’t talk in Manchester,

  we don’t talk at all as that would mean

   tending each others wounds and that,

      would be a significator for the canines to dine out on

           dine our on our woe,

 

             ‘we lick our cuts and scars in private but never in front of one another -

                    the mint toothpaste just a few steps away at the sink.’

 

     A shout went up in Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Sunderland,

             Birmingham, London – Glasgow and Beyond the UK to the shores of France,

                  Europe too and then the Big Apple -

                        as the lyrics say,

                           ‘Bolts from above hurt the people down below,

                                          people in this world we have no place to go……………..’

 

                               ……..… “As wounded and drunk,

                                 why are we still singing the same concerns

                                      as our elderly and moreso;-

                                          is replacing Boddingtons Brewery

                                              with trendy Cash-flats going to stop

                                                      the eye in the sky confirming our prison?”

 

 

 

Michael J Waite. 22nd August 2024. Exiled to Scotland.