Cold Rain Doesn’t Wash Away Everything Poem by C Richard Miles

Cold rain sweeps clean the city pavements
Of spilt blood shed last night too soon.
Youth’s dreams dowsed and drowned and deadened.
Light replaced by guilt and gloom.

Bright streetlamps shine but yours is broken,
Cut the current, cleaved the flesh,
Hope’s heart excised by shining silver,
Glamour slashed to shabby shreds.

Cold rain won’t wash away the heartbreak,
Tears may fall but stains remain.
Loved ones scream in silent suffering.
Blades bite deep as death in them.

Bright futures shine for other people.
You have none: your family’s dead
And slain as though the crazed assassin
Thrust his knife through them instead.

Cold rain may fall through all their lifetimes
Still gore’s grimness clings so dense
Obliterating love and pleasure
Anger stultifying sense.

Bright headlines shout their mournful message
Loud lamenting wasted lives.
Let’s not heed their raucous ranting:
Mindsets kill, not guns nor knives.