Pause For Poetry:
Michael Hawkes /68

The Tallest Wall

A poem by Michael Hawkes

A flock of doves atop the wall turns black

as it merges with a murder of quarrelsome crows.

The songs of peace now raucous caws,

as hails of stones,

assail the beasts in armoured cars

on the ready to attack.

Graffiti on the wall are black,

scrawled with cinders from the pyre

by boys who clamber up

the stack of cordwood corpses reaching

far above their heads to mark

their slogans ever higher.

Though mile on mile eight metres tall

one day soon the wall will crack

from the force of their desire.

Then in the slits mere orange pips

will sprout to make the defile fall.

The boys will gain their birthright back

with space to prosper and aspire.

17/12/17 – Hawkes

Feature image: Oren Ziv/Activestills.org

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