August 4th, 2014 and my LIGHTS WENT OUT @ 10pm...

Candlelight Vigil

Beyond a candle’s flame

I searched the darkness

For a semblance of solemnity from the hour.

But none came.

Merely the spectre of Gaza and the callousness

Of the media’s mischievous power…

And I wept.

Not so much, I fear,

For the War which failed to end all wars,

But more for the inept,

Irrational, irrevocable inevitability which became clear:

That truly, World War One mechanised all future wars…

I raised my head then and the silence hurt.

Disturbed, I sought battlefields

For an image in my imagination:

A trench, barbed-wire, rats, or dirt;

Wreckage, carnage, pillage and all that shelling yields,

Yet uncannily I saw a tree aflame, amidst death and desolation…

And thus I wept again,

For the plane, charred and bare:

An enigma, incongruous, oblivious to the furore-

Enduring, withering, heightening my disdain;

The annihilation somehow isolating it there,

A symbol of destruction to put an end to all war…

Pete Ray

August 4th 2014

The 10pm-11pm hour and a candlelight vigil of remembrance in my lounge.

Attempting to concentrate upon World War One was tough on this occasion, due to the media’s biased and unbalanced reporting of the troubles in Gaza.

A charred plane tree then became my focus.

No idea why.

I still hurt.