Speedy's Fear

This poem is dedicated to ‘Speedy’, the elderly factotum at my business in Hong Kong. We were forced to close the firm in 1999 because of the impact of the Asian financial crisis, and one hundred and fifty staff, including me, lost their jobs. 
    The poem is written as a sonnet in iambic pentameter, except for lines 10 and 12, which are in trochee pentameter, whereby I’ve deliberately shifted the emphasis to particular words for greater impact.


I've blighted many anxious lives today,
For we must close as Asian markets crash.
A softly-spoken older man did weep
In grief and anguish at my futile words,
For fear and terror stalked him as a child
As he fled at first from the Rising Sun,
And then the fevered chaos of Mao's Red Guard.
Yet he was young and had, with luck, survived,
But now he's terror-struck once more. He fears
Empty days amid his Mong Kok high-rise,
And pleads in tears for answers I can't give,
'Where will I go each day? What will I do?
My life is here among you, my friends,
Will you allow me to work here without pay?'

Photo: Andre Halim at Unsplash














Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Portrait of a strangely-dressed man

Image
I have used the relative freedom afforded by free verse to ‘paint’ a portrait of a man I suspected was an illegal immigrant from China when out walking in the wild, rural hills north of Ko Tong in the New Territories of Hong Kong. The range of jade-green peaks unfolded before me Towards a horizon shrouded by a curtain of haze. The mist caught the morning sun in a fleeting rainbow, To gild the stone village homes in the valley below. He emerged from the bush, shifting uncomfortably From one foot to another, brushing off some grass, Tugging at his cheap, unfamiliar polyester suit, Smoothing wrinkles, giving the lie to his anxiety. Beneath his straight dark hair, fear and uncertainty Clouded his pale, angular face. I greeted him, smiling; He bowed, uncomprehending and hesitant, incongruous In his dark suit, days-old white shirt and narrow black tie. He made a futile effort to clean his plastic ‘city’ shoes, Keeping his black briefcase beside him, like a child’s toy, Expectant, as if hopin
Read more

A Guardian of Empire

Image
This poem is my first attempt at writing in contemporary ‘free verse’. I believe poetry written without a form of control is like music written without order, and it becomes a mess.  The poem is completely unstructured with no metre or rhyme; instead, I have tried to create a readable poem by using sentence structure, punctuation, language and the natural flow of the spoken word. We must go to school somewhere, and mine was an idyllic island, of unbounded childhood joy. A bulwark of English tradition amidst the social upheaval, the anarchy, perhaps, of the ‘60s, with a progressive outlook, if one was of the Edwardian era, for it was a training ground for the Guardians of Empire. And I loved it. I was steeped in its timeless values:  of fair discipline,  academic excellence, and sporting prowess. Our gaggle of ancient and venerated teachers, all veterans of wars past, of Ypres and the Somme,  Normandy and the Yangtze Kiang, tried to shape my impressionable mind. They did better than my
Read more

At Eston Cemetery, Plot M205

Image
This poem is dedicated to the memory of Private Patrick O’Callaghan (40296) of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. He now lies, almost forgotten, in an unmarked grave near Middlesbrough. Patrick was brought home from France in November 1917, alive but a broken man. We visited his grave in 2024, he has no memorial but this poem. Stand easy, brother; my war is over. Our kin know of my soldier's forfeit, They’ve stood their solemn vigil by my side, Now, we may sleep beneath the vaulted skies. No Portland stone bears witness to my fate Amid the torn and tortured fields of France; A shattered soul, they brought me home to rest, For our futile war had crushed my mind. My bitter war was fought alone, unseen By others until I screamed in haunted fear, And would suffer the thoughtless jests of fools, As shell-shocked nerves conjured with my limbs. In time, this earth became my peaceful bed, And the freshly mown grass became my shroud, Oft draped in dew and red and golden leaves, So long I’ve
Read more