A State of Terrorism

There are tunnels everywhere,

they lie,

under every road,

under every building,

every field and every tent,

they lie.

They are all terrorists,

they lie,

the old men and women,

even the children, 

even the babies

born and unborn,

they lie.

The journalists are terrorists,

the aid workers are terrorists,

the artists and poets are terrorists,

the medics and nurses are terrorists,

the teachers and cooks are terrorists,

the dying, the dead and the buried are terrorists.

In a state of terrorism,

a state of terrorists,

they will lie and they’ll lie and they’ll lie.

The Circus

It was called ‘The Big Top’ so

I expected size and glitz and glamour

but it was small and tawdry inside.

I expected glamorous girls riding bareback 

not these surly unsmiling performers.

It was not like the circus of my dreams

where the unicorns were prancing,

flashing their rainbowed hooves,

pointing with their golden horns.

With sequinned swimsuited riders

they danced round and round

the circle of the ring

kicking up the gold dust ground 

from their droppings into

shimmering sawdust,

not that dirty looking soil

where no unicorn could find the gold

to nurture and replenish

their unique golden horns.