It was read on 2xx FM on ANZAC Day by Christopher Dorman.
Now republished by Poets for Peace on a new broadsheet in July 2012
Now republished by Poets for Peace on a new broadsheet in July 2012
To sleep, perchance to
dream - Hamlet (III, i, 65-68)
peace is lying deep within these
shallow ponds
calm and ceaseless sleep beneath the
leafy fronds
the searing heat, the screaming and
sirens have long ceased -
an all-abiding dreaming commenced at
their release
like sentinels the trees - that meant
no harm nor wrong -
yet eager roots still squeeze the
sleepers in tight bonds
with crumpled fists creased fabrics
peep from the greedy earth -
a shirt, a tattered piece of black and
knotted scarf
though reverently we tread over
splinters worn and bleached
and suggestions of a head - the dead
remain unreached
in pyramids piled neatly the sightless
ones are stocked
encased in glass discreetly - locked in
eternal shock
but none can stop the plunder - its
intent as cold as steel
while innocence still slumbers in these
patient fertile fields
© Hazel Hall
Phnom Penh 8 August 2009
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