Chris McDonnell: A Gaza Story
… words from Gaza 2023- 2024.
Gaza This October
Monday, October 16th 2023
Hour by hour
countless
munitions fall
in an exchange
of fearsome fire.
Smoke erupts
from shattered
Buildings hanging
through the orange
glow of flame.
This narrow strip
of sea-edged land
littered streets
torn metal, broken
brick, shattered
tiles, lifeless forms.
Costly retribution for
a savage act, lost
lives, wailing cries
and threat of siege.
This land of youth
broken piece by piece.
Christ-caught in the
shadow of the cross.
A gale of destruction
sweeps the land
leaving a trail of
hollow hope amid
fading distant dreams
and worn-out words.
What next? and when
*******************
No Room At The Inn
Then
plenty of straw. And contented stock.
A woman in blue a man leaning on a staff,
well-lit, neat and tidy
with a baby wrapped in white.
Star-lit
Familiar.
Now
Scattered rocks, twisted iron
A man in a sweatshirt and
A woman in a shawl watch over an infant
Wrapped in a keffiyeh amid dust of plaster
And hanging drapes, the aftermath of attack
This troubled, turbulent year
*************************
No Place Is Safe
in no uncertain terms
Having been told
to pack up and leave the North,
for safety, the journey South began,
only for the story to be repeated.
Greeted by onslaught round Khan Younis
the furtive crowds were told to move again
as ground was laid waste about them.
Pleading hands and dried mouths
aching limbs drift pass. “I thirst!”
but the water bottles were dry.
Hunger and tongue-swelling thirst
worsens by the hour as tanks in the South
wreak vengeance on unarmed women
and children crying in their mother’s arms
no place is safe, nowhere free from fear
homes left behind, toys and clothes, gone.
“where shall I sleep tonight? will I wake in
the morning ? Daddy has gone missing “
“he’ll be back soon“ the lie is murmured,
knowing that he won’t be coming home at all.
***************************************
Climbing Walls
if we wash our hands of’
the conflict between the powerful
and the powerless we side with
the powerful-we don’t remain neutral – BANKSY
I learnt to climb walls when I was young,
scrambled to find a finger-lip to grasp,
pressed feet tight to hold a grip,
till no longer able to support my slender
frame, I dropped to the ground.
You asked how I got grazed knees and
white-washed hands so I told you a story
which you didn’t believe but
knowingly you told me not to try again.
I nodded silently through my tears.
Your tears, when they came, were not silent,
but a dark howl in the grey dawn light
when you told me of the killing of my mother
and elder sister as an exploding tank shell
took our home from us, leaving only despair.
The powerful take the powerless in the night,
rage in retribution, careless of their plight.
I will go back and climb that wall, and bring it down,
brick by brick, and so rebuild my broken home.
Where do you stand? Where is your voice?
*************************************
With Each Passing Bead
Hand-fingered beads
slip endlessly through
work-worn grime,
light dust blown
in the evening air.
A large orange sun
hangs low in the sky
over the broken city.
His empty hand cradles
a turbaned forehead.
With each passing bead
his lips move in silence
as in personal reflection
he offers prayer.
***************
Remains
Silent spaces
row after row of ragged holes
of street side dwellings, edged
by rutted roads.
A toothless gasp, a
sightless stare, an eyeless face,
their empty concrete cranium,
a crushed echo box
holding the discordant cries of
distant loitering children
littered with distorted charred
fragments tossed and broken,
their origin, indeterminate.
their future, unknown.
******************************
Broken Days
Khan Yunis, Gaza – December 1:
Four days stretched to seven, then the
thread was broken.
The search among the debris resumed.
Rockets flew again
and explosives rained down on homes
as people gathered
lifting, searching, crying, looking in hope,
desperate for voices,
finding only broken bricks among rubble.
Splintered wooden
rafters hung angled overhead draped in
ripped materials.
The silence was brief, the smoke cleared
hostages exchanged
lost voices fill the night again
with screams.