BIRTH OF AN ALIEN - A work in progress.The following three poems (or three parts of one poem), still in draft form, are of necessity laid out consecutively; ideally (though impossibly) they should be read concurrently as each covers much the same period of the same individuals life. Autobiography is a new verse game for me but, I would appreciate any comments on the work so far.BIRTH OF AN ALIEN
Part One - SHADOWS (Draft IIIA)
I was born -
unimaginably young -
to a backdrop of war
fought on a global scale.
Doodlebugs fledged their way
across the scene of my nativity -
I swear (a legacy
of wild imaginings)
I heard the engines stall
as death descended
plague-like
from the sky.
Childhood and youth
were spent
in the shadow
of a mushroom cloud –
as if by miracle
our lives went on.
Remaining unconvinced
by the ‘deterrence’ lie -
and guided by the light
of ‘Spies for Peace -
I joined the siege of bunkers -
which did not exist
according to
the parliamentary line –
where those that govern
could survive
improbable attacks.
Loophole acknowledged -
their reasoning must be
to strike pre-emptively
and I declined
the opportunity –
disowned all those prepared
for genocide, became
an alien in my own land.
Malcolm Evison
11 - 13 May 2009
BIRTH OF AN ALIEN
Part Two – LIGHT
Wrapped in a world full of love
whilst all around
was hate and fear -
(the enemy was thwarted
but not forgiven -
their future generations
would be tarnished
by the mark of Cain -
I failed to understand
that reasoning).
From my own comfort
rich in love
if not in pennies
I began to see
the world
through eyes
of others understanding -
took stands upon
my parents faith
reluctantly accepted
proscriptions
unknown to many
of my friends.
Sunday was decisively
the Lord's Day -
my father worked
being a preacher man -
my mother worked
looking after the family -
that was the day
I could not venture
out to play
with friends
whose parents
were otherwise
persuaded.
The radio was silent
save for the news
or hymn singing.
This was our Sabbath Day -
the would be sanctified
could only pray
for those proverbial sheep
so far astray -
it seemed
as if the second covenant
was made of rules
almost forgetting
the liberty of grace.
Malcolm Evison
14 May 2009
BIRTH OF AN ALIEN
Part Three – THE SCHOOL OF DOOM (Draft IIA)
A rebel prepared
for any cause
I traversed many
scenes but never found
my niche. I knew
from early teens
what I must be, but first
I must break free.
Eager to break the bonds
of school (a kind of punishment
for being young)
I dreamed my time away.
Moving from one school
to the next, never quite worked my way -
fell foul of alien traditions.
Compelled to join a company of snobs –
(a secondary punishment, once removed,
for my eleven-plus success) -
teachers just failed
to understand the differing curriculum
from one part of the country
to the next; dismissed me
as unworthy of attention
when I couldn’t understand
their different scheme of things.
They made me hooker
in their rugby union game,
when all I knew was soccer
not the queer toffs routine -
no-one attempted to explain
the rules and I became
a victim, kicked and ground
down. The previous absence
of a swimming pool
ensured I never learned to swim,
except against the tide -
they held me under
at the deeper end, then failed
to understand my trauma –
a baptism through drowning.
Loving to play with words
I soon lost patience
with the drill of prosody;
where words for me
had always throbbed with life,
they squeezed out their last breath
and bound them in a shroud
of grammar. Music
to me was singing,
but others in the class
had learned to read
a simple score -
the music man interpreted
attendance at a different school
as ignorance, my forte thwarted
by a different scale
of learning, and a tyrant’s whim.
And these were meant to be
the best years of one’s life?
Even school trips, had I been able
to partake, were way beyond
my parents means; in fifties Britain -
skiing had never been a part
of our lifestyle scheme,
not even part of any dream –
I made excuses, skulked
in the background
as if ashamed of being poor –
I never left these shores.
Malcolm Evison
15/16 May 2009
