Five Poems by RC deWinter

 

flag day 2025

when the rumbling of hungry armour 

drowned out the misery 

of a once great nation

i knew the end was near

and being a rebel with many causes

the calculator in my mind

began weighing the benefits 

of breathing against the peace 

of the grave

but the sharp spurs of a promise made

pricked my heart 

with the remembrance of a man

who gave all for his country

and tasting the bitter salt of tears

on dry cracked lips stood up 

got dressed 

polished my sword 

and put on the armour of righteousness

to stand proud and tall

in the face of all opposition

those who would destroy us for profit

for power and all accruing to that hubris

knowing no matter what the outcome

i could sleep easy in my grave

as a faithful servant of our founding

and though i'm only one

i am a conscript in an army of millions intent on saving the bright vision 

writ on ancient parchment

a still living breathing document

now on life support 

that without the determination

of true patriots will crumble 

into scraps of history 

traded by those with more greed 

than honour for the tarnished silver

of 30 pieces

the parade

tanks will be rolling down the streets 

of the capital in a display 

of hubris and the waste

of millions of dollars 

that could be feeding the hungry

and housing the homeless

to celebrate the deconstruction

of a country once committed

to ideals scribed in ink

on an ancient parchment 

now crumbling in the shards

of smashed glass 

that once protected it

and while never perfect we strove 

to fulfil them as best as possible 

in the imperfection accruing 

to the human race

but i caught in the maelstrom

of a world on fire

disintegrating in volleys 

of unchoreographed bullets

flying in the shot and shell

of bragadoccio 

won’t be watching

i'll be weeping at this waste of millions that could be feeding the hungry

housing the homeless 

and healing a country torn apart

by traitors preaching a gospel 

of hatred designed to fraction us

into splinters of what should be united

but instead will be glorifying 

the black-hearted puppet chosen to be the face of our destruction

still even in the despair blanketing me in the blackness 

of our disunification i arise every day

polishing my ancient armour

to speak truth to the power

of these vipers and their army 

of blackshirts rounding up 

the most vulnerable and helpless

among us to send them off to whatever hellhole in the world will take them

while vilifying those they can’t export

and though it’s only likely 

a matter of time before 

they also come for us

i'll continue to stand in the hail 

of verbal bullets that may someday

be aimed at the native born 

who dare to call their treason 

for what it is as i remember

those of us already sacrificed

to the greed and ambition of those

who in 1776 would not have been 

sent away but instead 

would be hanging helpless

on the tree of liberty

stardom

drenched in the warm green breath 

of spring i stripped down to skin

and stood in the light 

of the ripe flower moon

arms outstretched

wishing i could fly 

and become one of the stars

decorating that sapphire blanket

with the silver of eternity

imagining how it would be to eavesdrop on the wishes and prayers of millions crying out to heaven 

in the universal patois of hope desire heartbreak and despair

i've been one of those millions 

and even knowing what will be will be forswore disbelief

as drunk on the intoxicant of hope

i cried out to those silent sentinels

on nights when sleep

was an elusive dream evaporating 

in the pain of loss 

flames of desire 

or the hope of rescue 

from the winding sheet of sorrow

and in the mercy of one who knows

what it is to be denied many more times than that triplet in the garden

i would grant every wish springing from

truth and sincerity to brighten the lives of millions and heal the misery of ills 

to which the human heart is heir

blind faith

the smooth cedar boards
of the ground-level deck out back
are slick with the tears of heaven
dripping slowly from a light grey sky
mine 
yours 
the world’s

mingling in a silent ballet 
of personal and shared sorrow

as the heartbreak we own 
and the pain of the world
bathes those boards 
in the slow steady drip
of what we’ve lived 
what we’ve seen
all we cannot change

and though we know 
the sun will shine again
we also know for some things
there is no remedy
yet still we rise and carry on
with the business of living
in a world that guarantees nothing
but that night will follow day 
and vice versa

which is why we hold onto hope
that often frail candle
wavering in our chests
in our dreams 
as we move through 
the corridor of time

knowing like life 
nothing lasts forever

and clutching our amethysts
hope the gods can hear our prayers 

rising to wherever it is they live 
as they choreograph the future
in the silence that lives beyond
all we cannot see

Church Supper, New England

The fiddles – there are three –

are badly out of tune, and the thumping

of the bass is as heavy and portentous 

as the summons of the Reaper himself.

Stout Yankees surround me as I sit,

alone, as out of place as that dark imp

at Sleeping Beauty’s christening.

Farmers, truckers, carpenters all –

their ladies bulging in stretch pants

and home-knitted, loud-yarned sweaters –sit gossiping between great mouthfuls of corned beef and cabbage,

boiled red potatoes and carrots as large as any dildo on display in a toy shop.

I know these folk.

They’re shrewd and they’re earthy

but at the same time they’re prudish

and I hear no jokes about carrots

as I eavesdrop, my nose in my journal,

on their homespun conversations.

I have not worn my red shoes

to this church supper,

for all New Englanders know

that red shoes are the mark of a witch,

and for all their fumbling pretensions

to the progress of the world

these rockribbed worthies

would never suffer a witch to live.

RC deWinter’s poetry is widely anthologized, notably in New York City Haiku (NY Times/2017), The Connecticut Shakespeare Festival Anthology (River Bend Bookshop Press, 12/2021) New Contexts:3 Coverstory Books, April 2022) in print: 2River View, Event Magazine, Last Stanza Poetry Journal, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, the Minnesota Review, Plainsongs, Prairie Schooner, Southword, the ogham stone, York Literary Review among many others and appears in numerous online publications.