Join the Neopoet online poetry workshop and community to improve as a writer, meet fellow poets, and showcase your work. Sign up, submit your poetry, and get started.

A People abandoned

I know of a people abandoned,
whose dusk never turns to dawn,
light has refused to flush away their nights,
so their lives are lived in the hours of an owl;
under skies in midnight apparitions, they tremble and fall,
riding roughshod over them incubuses.

I know of a people gasping for life,
whose world is sorrow's cup,
whose hopes are as crushed clays
soaked in waters of despair.
They dwell and toil in burning swamps;
on slick hillsides with drifty temperament.

I know of a people chased away from food,
stung out by hunger, driven down the back alleys of kismet,
where cries wall up to a watery fortress.
Around them, eerie dungs of poverty pile up,
creaking under the tiny paws of children hawking for pittances,
whose tomorrow is immolated for the greed of today;
these children, don in rags, starve around riches.

They're the people beaten down by political oppression,
cast away by a social class with teeth like a great white shark;
they're the abused, whose faces are grim tales of despondency,
slashed and scarred daily by the whip of injustice
and, with thorny tendrils, leashed to the gates of horror.
What a people, a helpless bunch!
littered carelessly along the reeky streets of Nigeria!

They've cried themselves to fear, their voices bound by threats,
now can't talk, nor whisper,
their tongues are heavy with tragedies;
their legs from the beatings of political cudgel swollen,
and can't carry them.
Around them, vultures gather,
waiting upon their fall, upon the loss of their bid for life,
to make a feast of their soon abandoned carcasses.

Review Request (Intensity): 
I want the raw truth, feel free to knock me on my back
Review Request (Direction): 
What did you think of my title?
How was my language use?
What did you think of the rhythm or pattern or pacing?
How does this theme appeal to you?
How was the beginning/ending of the poem?
Is the internal logic consistent?
Editing stage: 

Comments

Very strong images and forceful read. There is nothing I can suggest in terms of craft. You have crafted a powerful poem
The only suggestion might be in content. In a way you are describing most people for the last 3000 years. Virtually every land, every people, has a history of war, slavery, greed, a few winners and the majority losers. Nothing seems to alter the human condition though idealists have tried. Look at the fucked up mess communism brought the world. So I would perhaps suggest you focusing on the specifics of your region, your reality
Your country and the horrors unique to that place.
This is a sad poem. Tell us more about these people you know. Where is any hope? Any redemption? Is there any dream of change? Only you, the visionary, the poet, can help us start to clear the path

Eumolpus
I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing
than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance
ee cummings

First and foremost, I truly appreciate your generous comments and more so your didactic take on the issue of global injustice, which breaks the heart so much. I see it as a solemn appointment to use the power of the ink to paint the world exactly as it is. Thanks.

Bathe yourself with poetry and let the world go to pieces.

author comment
(c) Neopoet.com. No copyright is claimed by Neopoet to original member content.