From Workshop New Poetry, number 27, 1975.
The Plague Is Here
October is the human month
Bringing
Blood on the pavements blood blood
Wash it off down the gutters blood
Voices sound that loud
Someone lets off a firework
Which reminds of the Guildford bombing
And those young men and those girl soldiers who died
No need to write a plague on both your houses
The plague is here
IRA scrawled on the walls
While the trees in their russets and gold stand
(O colour our souls in such colours!)
And sound the Last Post
Without making a sound.
Ewart Milne
standupandspit 