Blocking It Out

I was the queen of blocking it out 
Back in 2020
And the streets were empty
Are we all suffering from the trauma
Of a year and a half of flora and fauna
Growing up through the pavements that we don’t walk
And it’s only electronically that we talk
But somehow I found some kind of telepathy
Some community
That are united around the pain
And it all falls as rain
And I was terrified
Of the people who have already died
In case a list of names might be added
To the families already saddened
By the might of a hand that swipes across
And we count the ones we’ve lost
And I remember the first one that was fallen as I stood by her bed
And she said
That’s just the way it’s gonna be for a while
And some people could find a way to smile
But I was buried under the timber
And now I’m listening to a singer
Articulate it so much better than me
The weather got wetter but now I see
That I was tapped into the collective fear
And I quenched it in a place that was not near
To home
Because I couldn’t be alone
I could sense it coming
Now everyone is running
Away from something smaller than a cell
Capable of unleashing hell
Now I”m watching Israel bombing Gaza
Like we haven’t been through it all together
And they’re using Covid suits to protect them from the weather
And make nappies for the babies
While we’re told that the dragons have rabies
And it’s catching kind
Some humanity that’s left behind
As what divides us conquers
And it’s as if those who run the place want us
To devour our tail
And the part of me that is not up for sale
Rails against the storm in the sea
I thought I was alone but it was just me




Éire Go Deo

I watch the images of bombed out bars
And burnt out cars
On city streets
And I know that the heat
Is born from a fervour deep and true
I feel it in me and I see it in you
And somehow peace has found a way
To hold and that’s the order of the day
It’s been 800 years
And so many women have cried tears
Over lost sons
And I could be the one
To finally unpeel
The way they made our nation feel
As they circumscribe the land
And say this must be tilled by hand
And no more than so many yards
I don’t even know how hard
It must have been
And my dream
Has been rocked
Like the walls made up by people locked
In Connemara by the rule of the day
To hell or to Connaught, isn’t that the way
And we can bark orders and we can make decrees
But that Ireland isn’t me
It’s something other
It’s living and breathing for your brother
And dying with hands crushed together
Nowadays we just complain about the weather
But the sadness is embedded in the roots
Of the great tree that began as shoots
From the fertile soil
I feel my blood boil
When someone talks about English rule
The things they taught us in school
About how to bend and break
And why they did it for our sake
And we must be respectful, too
Because they are human just like you
Then someone utters a word
And just like that the bird
Of hatred is born
Because the fire of fear is still warm
And glowing embers
Not everyone knows but the heart remembers
Even when the mind forgets
And it’s not over yet
Not till the trauma storm
Has made the people realise they warm
Their hands on the coals of the past
And in some ways people are classed
In the stratosphere
I feel the time near
When we must stand up and be counted
Oh, what has it amounted
To but this
Heaven is in the first kiss

Image Credit: https://pin.it/72pZollRr

Messy Little Snowflake

Messy little snowflake having your child 
I used to be impetuous, I used to be wild
Now I just come to dock at the bay
And learn to say I love you anyway
And the youth of my generation
Are estimated to spend less time at the station
Getting on trains
Or making bodies with bloodstains
And there’s a hidden kind of invisible trauma
When they encourage you but don’t inform ya
Of the onset of pain
Flowing from you like cyclical rain
To prepare the ground for the seed
And half of us will bleed
Out what we’ve come to make
You say you do it for my sake
But do you know what you plant
When you call my words a rant
That aim to please
Til I’m screaming on my knees
As I fulfil my function
But we’ve come to a sort of junction
And you make a hard right
In the car and the night
Comes to envelop us both
And I know that you live to hope
In what I offer but I
Am not willing to die
To bring another soul on the scene
That was somebody else’s dream
Since I was eighteen
I would rather reign as the queen
Of my own domain
But I hear you ask again
For a match to spark a light
And you ask someone else, am I right
To be your two point five caretaker
And I know you didn’t make her
But it still feels like force
And you living without remorse
For your bullet pen
But if I had a choice, I’d let you in again

Trauma And Its Evidence

https://youtu.be/zlsEbeX8IG8

Do I break the lid on categorical pain
That seems to be as seasonal as rain
And some people walk through a waterfall
But they don’t seem to get wet at all
And I climbed up mountains and I ran down valleys
Befriended enemies and demonized allies
But it never got me away
From what I quintessentially say
And as a baby I cried a lot
But what was it that time forgot
My first day of school
Or when that girl broke the golden rule
Watched my reflection in another’s eyes
Or felt the pain when somebody dies
Like my skin is being ripped from my bones
Or the silence when I’m all alone
Feels so much like peace
When the noise cease
And you can’t erase the childhood you own
The good, the bad, before the iPhone
That we didn’t post
Or the narcissism when that person ghost
Me over something I didn’t say
So I let her walk away
Took it out on a guy
Who was the answer and the reason why
The stars shone like diamonds in his eyes
He suddenly lit up the night skies
And the river runs deep and true
I forgot about loss the moment that you
Held my hand, they were all asleep
And is it just like a trinket I keep
Like so many others
And the cloud smothers
Me with its love
Though I still look above
For a being I can’t find
I didn’t really go out of my mind
I just had to get away
And what people say
Claws at me
But the thaw reaches deep and sets me free
From the aching of time
A moment, nothing, and then It was mine