Category: Anti-war

A Banner Of Sunflowers

Continuing on from yesterday’s Ekphrastic poetry workshop, here is my poetic response to Shirley Drayton’s creative piece of textile artwork “Golden Sunflowers”

A Banner Of Sunflowers


look!

up there

above the War’s

darkest clouds

there is a blue banner

embroided with sunflowers

swaying

through a hole

in the eastern sky


bearing a message

of ‘Hello’

or is it ‘Goodbye’?

a sweeping reminder

from our Ancestors

“we feel your suffering and pain

from the merciless hard rain

blood filled rivers and cratered plains

smoke filled skylines and cracked windowpanes”


“however, we also know

beyond the broken horizon

the sunflower seeds of hope

will germinate again

and future seeds for peace

will regenerate a new campaign“






Ivor Steven (c) May 2022

Sunflower Seeds (a Tanka)

Over at Weekly Prompts, the monthly Colour Challenge for May is:  Mellow Yellow. Please go and visit their fabulous site by clicking >> Here . Below is my “Tanka” response to their ‘Colour Prompt’ ..



Sunflower Seeds (a Tanka)



Blue skies were mellow

Fields were peaceful and yellow

Sunflowers grew free

Then foreign tanks squashed their seeds

On tomorrow’s scarred harrows






Ivor Steven (c) May 2022

Beyond Crickets And Mushrooms




Autumn has been dry and warm

And the earth remains cracked

Providing cosy homes for the field critters

The brown crickets are thriving

And hopping along shared tracks

Innocently dancing there

Beyond the murdering arms of war


Mushrooms are sprouting on the verges

Stoically poised on stumpy stems

Under sheltering white caps

Nature’s nutritional ground fruit

Innocently standing there

Beyond the murdering arms of war






Ivor Steven (c) April 2022

Day One, is up at Coffee House Writers Magazine

Hello dear readers and followers, as you may know, I now write for “Coffee House Writers” magazine on a fortnightly basis, and my poem “Day One”, is in this weeks edition of Coffee House Writers Magazine. … please click on the link below and visit my poem, at Coffee House Writers >> https://coffeehousewriters.com/day-one/



Day One

Before Day One

I wished upon a star
That the milk-bar
Was not too far away
My life’s bread was crumbling
My weathered hands were funmbling
Witnessing the last supper was humbling

Day One

There, beyond the darkness
Out in the universe
From a million light-years away
Under an alien’s microscopic frame
We would all look the same

After Day One

I wished for the dust to settle
Then waited for rusted gunmetal
To mature into household kettles
Whistling hallelujah to new sunflower petals






Ivor Steven (c) April 2022

When You Can See, It’s A Crime To Be Blind




Did you see the sunrise this morning?

The horizon was like a golden blind


Did you read the news at lunchtime?

The headlines were dark and unkind


Did you watch the night sky fall this evening?

The stars looked like yellow pieces of shrapnel


Do you know our planet earth?

Exists only as a moment in time


Do you know that the universe?

Created all reason and rhyme


Do you understand Mr Shootin’ Putin?

That you are the world’s worst crime

Heartlessly deaf, cruelly dumb, and compassionately blind






Ivor Steven (c) April 2022

A Seventy-Year-Old Mind, is up at Coffee House Writers Magazine

Hello dear readers and followers, as you may know, I now write for “Coffee House Writers” magazine on a fortnightly basis, and my poem “A Seventy-Year-Old Mind”, is in this weeks edition of Coffee House Writers Magazine. … please click on the link below and visit my poem, at Coffee House Writers >> https://coffeehousewriters.com/a-seventy-year-old-mind/



A Seventy-Year-Old Mind

I cry like a newborn baby
I have the naive curiosity of a child
Over the years I have learnt to listen
And the wisdom gained
Lives on
Inside my seventy-year-old mind

I would like to think
I am honest and kind like my dad
And his calm gentle guidance
Lives on
Inside my seventy-year-old mind

I Know I have inherited the strengths
Of resilience and persistence
From my orderly and energetic mum
And her smiling persuasive ways
Live on
Inside my seventy-year-old mind

Compassion was gifted to me
By my gracious and courageous wife
She gave her halo of love to everyone
Who were fortunate enough to meet her
And she lives on
Inside my seventy-year-old mind

I do not know you, Mister Putin
But I heard today
You will be seventy soon
But our world will live on and on
Have you the courage to change your ways?
Inside your seventy-year-old mind






Ivor Steven (c) April 2022

Red Noses and Sad Frowns




There are good clowns and bad clowns 

In yesterday’s nightmare, a big bad clown 

Trampled everyone in my friend’s hometown 

He wore a big Red nose and a big sad frown 

Destroying every peaceful thing around 

When his big red shoes kicked the ground 

The world’s worst fears were then found

To be in the hands of a bad Russian clown  






Ivor Steven (c) March 2022