Voices is intended to be a collection of poems written and illustrated
by Mike Burr .
children
"bright morning young children
scream your thorough delights
into mornings orange air and run around like aeroplanes
steam trains birds and darts
upon the late dawn decaying
then when hunger makes you cry or rattled by some failure
the rough bread of scarce life will be yours
and you may delight upon its full stomach
but be reminded
as is tradition throughout this world
that some may not fill themselves today
upon those simple pleasures
and that the world has joy and evil
embroiled in its morning stew
some in thimblefuls and others ladled out wanton and wasted
though excess is generally not within the humble
as meanness is not always found in wealth
but in carelessness"
thats how she thought and taught and sometime talks
she is a teacher and a bit of an airhead
but clothed in that thin naivety
yet she is beautiful in its outline nakedness
her voice mingling with that of the children
within her womb of gentle simplicity
i am as certain as sure
that they will all be safe
and she is making that womb as she would have liked it
for she felt her childhood was one of journeys
without much purpose
jolted from from place to place
from camp to camp unsettled
with no foundation except family
and a parent stressed
so competition for favour among those peers
did not play well upon her lovely features
and made her wild
yet in the end
somewhat self assured
and that with its paranoia deep rooted
in uncertainty
and its determination
reminded me so much of my father
yet the subtlety is in the blood
and it did not bind us in its fluid iron knot
and its desperation
in the end became a chore of support
even now should we meet or talk
i ask how is this or that pillar
within that deep vault
subconscious to your self
and even now you will
feel recriminations disease
and say i never gave enough
and in my way
i look vacantly to the foreward ground
and feel
some children demand more
than the adult can give