Winning Words: Resurrection 1

WINSTON FARRELL
The ArtsEtc NIFCA Winning Words Anthology: 2019/2020, Cover.

 

 

No kites up in the air this year
No singing angels’ majestic climb
No raging bulls
No dancing round-kite
Square-kite
Box-kite
Not a bat-kite in the blue sky

Little ones
Distracted by a different story 
Backs turned to this ascension 
Too busy
Plugged into their PlayStations
YouTube fingers google walking portable brains

Young men
Will play the tail 
Pop string haul in all hope
Let out all crosses 
An albatross around the neck to cope 
Crucifying their own for bits of gold and silver

There was a time when trash-bone
Stems from a coconut tree leaf
The famous feedbag and shop paper
Clamman-cherry berries
Flour water paste
Glued the frame of old newspaper joy
A resurrected piece of dead plastic 
A poor-child prescription
Fleet footing across pasture
Upping 
Upping
Upping their hope
Catching wind and wisdom

Festival of flying colours 
A halleluiah chorus in the sky 
On cane-ground on pasture land
A choir of flesh and bone
Manipulating the cords of glory
Hauling in and letting out
The strain of string and thing  
The tell and tail of flying kite

No kites stakeout tonight
Only bullets replacing the sound of bulls
Bullying the labours, robbing the workers’ sleep

Who would believe that we once flew 
Higher than kites without string
On our own accord
With no regard for planes and powerlines

Editor's Note: The last line of this poem in the printed anthology appeared without its last three words.  Here corrected, ArtsEtc regrets the omission.  

Winston Farrell (Silver, 2019) has received a number of awards for his poetry and plays. A theatre practitioner and performance poet, Farrell has travelled extensively, sharing his work with the world.  He has also recorded a number of his “Pop-Poems,” including the classic “Bus Man” to most recently “Jes’ Us & Them” and “I Cry.” His collection of poetry Barefoot on Ice was a joint winner of Barbados’ Governor General’s Award of Excellence in Literary Arts.

The ArtsEtc NIFCA Winning Words Anthology
Barbadian Literature
Caribbean Literature
poetry