Selected poems
Deliver us from evil
Faces alight, heads bowed, kneeling
Thumbing shiny orbs from right to left
Counting their blessings, prostrating
Lamenting their losses, pleading
Standing, ears burning for the words
Spewing in unending streams
From the new pulpit
Wild-eyed pontificates professing
The good, the bad, the immortal struggle
How to arm yourself for a shifting world order
Where darkness gives way
To a pixellated light
A new religion for our children
Danger in low-lying areas
For months I watched
blue light in the darkness
small minds spill out small words
small hands spread and reach
to bend, warp, break
all that could be, should be great
For days I passed
the black screen
berating and blaming
the mass-entertaining
hooked on a loop, counting down
to more incoming footage
And here now in the grey light
comes the dawn
what if we are not seeking ruin
but searching the ruins
for a hand
battered and bruised
broad-backed, mud-slicked
bent but unbroken
reaching out of the mire
to catch a pale light
against the still
dark sky
The scattering
Defaced pages ripped
From a family scrapbook
Papers not in order
Dislodged leaves
Scattered on the breeze
Sister, brother and one other
Still unfolding in the mother
A short story barely begun
A father creased and worn
Tattered epic torn
A sad symphony drawn
From ragged notes
Folklore recycled
Over and over in
Candlelit sanctuaries
Where happier stories
Nestled between soft covers
Once upon a time
Anne Casey is an award-winning Irish-Australian writer/literary editor with work featured internationally in newspapers, magazines, journals, books, podcasts, broadcasts, videos and music albums. Her writing/poetry rank in The Irish Times newspaper's most-read. In 2017, Salmon Poetry published Anne's poetry collection, where the lost things go. She tweets as @1annecasey