FREEDOM

ORAL VERSION | FREEDOM

Freedom is a gift we can all afford to grant ourselves. It means nothing to most and everything to a few. Those who dare to stretch themselves away from the mainstream and are bold enough to bank solely on their ability to communicate and have ambition to see it through right until the end. Those are the works worth waiting for www. Those are the memorable voices that will, over-time, be heard by all..... 


Bubbling like brown rice in giant metal pots.
Listen to the sounds of the Underground. 
The murmur of distant voices rising, 
tiny sounds at first until the fullness is 
truly realised and the volume reaches our 
ears in order to be heard. Suddenly, 
the agony is understood firsthand 
and then those high pitch screams. 
Those unbearable shrieks that pierce 
the body like poisoned thorns, 
sending shockwaves into curdled blood, 
rapidly flowing around weak deflated arteries 
and thin human veins like freshly 
generated, clean and sharp electricity. 

Downplay the ignorance. 
Support the ground offensive. 
Play War Games on foreign soil. 
Drill bullets through the skulls of the damned. 
To ignore these cries would be a shameful travesty. 
To not download their significance would be an
utter disgrace. Grand plan, final attack, Drones 
released, terrorism hunted down, 
removed for good. The cries are coming from 
all those offended. All those affected. 
All those that are now gone. 
Dead and buried. 


Feet firmly rooted to the spot we, the afflicted 
have no chance but to digest this torment found. 
Head-splitting memory of reliving misery. 
The constant throbbing on a broken-heart, 
mended only by a night out and a finders-fee, 
bright lights, Bingo and cups of tea. 
What started as a friendly sparkler, 
quickly turned to fireworks, 
to mass murder 
with missiles never missing 
every site on target hitting. 
Blowing up the innocent 
from Baghdad to Kabul. 
Avoiding all the criticism 
from Edinburgh to Liverpool. 
Sending out our brave young lads 
from Islington to Hartlepool. 
From Gravesend to Nuneaton 
from slightly bruised to badly beaten. 

Catchphrases, soundbites and Celebrity. 
She’s pedigree and soon-to-be my destiny. 
Mix friends, stir well with a bedroom key. 
I'm-in agony on-ecstasy, medically I’m fine you-see. 
Watching you so jealously, finding my own chemistry. 
Fearful of nonentity, hoping for longevity. 
Regrettably I cannot be, the man you want so eagerly. 
I am pure complexity, a man without identity 
but plenty of integrity and I will love you endlessly. 


Here is to the freedom of saying what you like when you like. 


JP 05/03/15