Extracts from a Migrant's Diary

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._N._Taber

This may well be the last (new) poem I will blog before I go into hospital next week (Monday) for an operation on my infected elbow. As it is my right elbow and I am right-handed, keyboarding will almost certainly take longer for some time. Even so, I will link to posts/poems via my Google Plus site as and when I can. Meanwhile, I hope you will enjoy browsing the blogs as I may be unable to link to poems vis my Google + site as I try to do on a daily basis since being asked by regular readers to make accessing poems easier than random browsing:

https://plus.google.com/118347623673930289606

This poem was inspired by a conversation with a migrant from war-torn Syria some months ago.

EXTRACTS FROM A MIGRANT’S DIARY

Dreaming of distant lands,

sapphire seas, golden sands, treasures

of mind-body-spirit

equal to none, prize worthy of a poem,

can’t be measured out in coin  

Dreaming of distant shores,

where birds sing a welcome in the ear,

reflected in the shy smile

of a passer-by, equal to none for peace

and love, cue for a better life

Dreams of landing on the moon,

peering back through time and space,

seeing how Here-and-Now

offers so much more than once a place

to call home before crisis-hit

Waking to street sounds roaring

like a pride of hungry lions hunting prey

in a concrete jungle,

no sapphire sea, golden sand, birdsong

a warning, wishing them gone

Waking to damp stains on walls,

courtesy of landlords whose first language

a rhetoric counted out in coin,

invested in one-upmanship, measure

of a common nouveau status 

Wide awake, fierce stirrings within 
a body-mind-spirit so weary of battling time
and tide, yet forever inspired
by a rage to live, no matter the odds 
against winning the peace

Copyright R. N. Taber2017