Gary Dowsett

Gary Dowsett Poems

The Best Poem Of Gary Dowsett

Boxing Day 2004

The turkey’s skin, then draped in ragged curtains, never shivered.
The silver bells amongst the green were silent.
The laughter of the children with their Christmas toys delivered,
Assured us all that things were as they should be.
Our holiday, so carefully planned and bought and neatly holstered,
Was shifting gear, through rituals unseen.
Now fast, now slow, a noisy game, then gentle snoring, bolstered,
Assured us all that things were as they should be.

I never felt it, slouched amongst the cushions, over-eaten,
The water wet and climbing up to take me.
The screaming of their frightened young, the parents bruised and beaten,
In wildest dreams were things that never could be.
Their villages; grown from the land and fought for, yearly bettered
Were torn away, whole families were buried.
The choking salt and silt and sand and water now unfettered,
In wildest dreams were things that never could be.

How can it be that somewhere in the depth of mankind’s senses
A silver bell ne’er rang out loud to warn us?
The screaming of the children should have woken our defences,
Preparing us for chilling things that would be.
We should have felt the seabed rumble, nature’s awful raging;
The pounding should have echoed in our ears.
We should have sensed the mud, the blood, chaotic flood engaging,
Preparing us for chilling things that would be.

And, after all, the imagery of brick and bone and breaking;
Of children sitting lost amongst the rubble.
The devastation fresh and raw, the quiet seas now aching
Reminding us how vulnerable we all are.
An English market town’s whole population and another
Lay deep entombed beneath the saffron sand.
Or wrapped in plastic parcels, nameless, husband, daughter, mother,
Reminding us how vulnerable we all are.

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