Best Miners Poems
day in the life of a coal miner
in the darkness you hear them
their boots clumping along the cobbled stones
not dawn yet ...yet still they are on their way to work
young lads of 15 plus.
these are miners sons
following the traditions
each generation go down the pit
twelve long hours
twelve hours in the dark and dust
twelve hours shovelling the coal
hewn by their elders.
horses are used to pull the trams along
eight hours they work....
young lads work longer.
their little food tins....tiny tins..
a chunk of bread if lucky a dripping sandwich
a bottle of water completed the feast.
they stumble on that cobbled road to home
tired and weary, hopefully a hot bath awaits them
in front of the fire.
nearly too tired to eat the meagre food set out
falling asleep dreaming of sunshine and fun
reality such a different story.
penned 18 May 2016
Audio Below
The mining villages of Wales
are steeped in history and tales
of sons and fathers, duty-bound
who earned a pittance underground.
For generations miners toiled
with picks and shovels, faces soiled.
Their throats parched dry and fingers raw,
black gold the aim, etched scars the score.
And mountains whisper tales of men
who failed to re-emerge again.
Or nevermore could breathe with ease;
Sad victims of black lung disease.
In valleys shaped by pride and grit
within the black and hostile pit,
black powder prowled and took its prey
but brotherhood did not give way.
11/11/18
'Black powder poetry contest' : Sponsored by Anthony Slausen
Your Choice (3), sponsored by Brian Strand
Into the bowels of the earth we descend
Down into the pit of hell
Crawling on hands and knees to mine
This precious fuel they call coal
Now Petey and I we are almost men
He is ten and I'm eleven
Been working here, down this mine
These last two years and month now
Mum is counting on us as men
Since Dad died from consumption
Coughed every night, spat out blood
Now gone to be with Jesus
The work is hard, it's hot down here
To work by flickering candlelight
The dust so thick, you always taste it
It makes you cough and splutter
We've almost reached the coal face
When I can hear some rumbling
I turned my head to speak to Petey
When the world collapsed around me
I don't know how long I lay there
When sense returned to me
By the flickering light I could see
The roof caved in behind me
Now I don't know if Petey was safe
Or if Petey was buried under
But what I knew and the news was bad
This was a miner's worst nightmare
Not a breeze came through, no fresh air
The tunnel tightly sealed
I think I knew deep in my heart
My bones would find rest here
Time passed, don't know how long
The candle burned away
The last light my eyes did see
Then blackness all around
I had seen night and I'd seen black
But never before black like this
The silence too was deafening
A tear squeezed from my eye
I cannot cry, I am a man
But the tears slid down my cheeks
I told myself for Mum I cried
What will become of her
The air so stale, tis hard to breathe
My eyelids heavy, drooping
Slowly I drift off to sleep
Tomorrow I'll awake in heaven
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
About this poem:
Sadly children as young as five were sent down into the mines and should there be a cave in it was more economical to leave them there and keep mining in a different direction. Thousands of children perished working in mines.
.
The mass production of coal is dead,
Buried infer lamps carried on the head,
Halogen miners sang the unforgiving dirge,
With fragments of flaky particles emerge,
Drilling hammers that smote the ground,
Never again to hear its rumbling sound.
Voices roar like dragons in damp vapour,
Highlighted the dangerous drudgery caper.
Its miners turn to face the cold idle breeze
Lusty diggers of cave brought to their knees.
Dust off running tears in nocturnal eyes
Sparkled pay in dissonant redundancies.
Tipping poison pouring out of their coat,
Coals brightly burn diamonds in the heat.
Hem and skirt tossed away in good wave,
The blockade collapsing stairs of the brave.
Sad hearts dramatically ending the way of life,
Kiss the face pioneers abandon with cheek.
Dirty power of bygone industrial revolution,
The demise ends centuries of veiled tradition.
Looks that is lost on the cloudy grey glare,
Tunnels bearing signature of the slender tear.
Tattoo rippled down on jagged wall mirrors,
Romantic fires to stare at the mantle towers.
Underground roads in loops of fuel suspended,
Prison row of tombs lay silently on the cold bed.
Rock fractals calling from cold depth of earth,
Snuffed out the foggy union in oblivious wrath.
Dripping tar brooms lay on the dormant floor,
Once supplied daily ration meals for the poor.
Now the pit is shut leaving the empty trucks,
Pulling the souvenirs bearing burden buckets.
Into the nostril part of murky breath exhale,
Indifference steps crystallised among the stubble.
Can we face climate change of clean living?
In the beautiful candescent global warming.
High home summer hill
Straining, sucking, sitting
Staring, stopped and stick-
A pit-prop tight and gripped.
The trees across the valley
Much higher than he can go now.
I pant to reassure him
In time with his withered eyes.
His tongue, tombed gritty green
He’s faithful, though he’s fading
Bones in death-grey jumper
Where will he lead me next?
from 'Layer Cake' 2009
http://amzn.to/vXCEFa
Each man with his lunch box looks straight ahead
into the lens. It’s dawning, above ground.
Why think about a sweetheart still a-bed?
Each man with his lunch box looks straight ahead.
They’re going down. Lost daylight like the dead
who never rise. Their pay is pick and pound.
Each man with his lunch box looks straight ahead
into the lens. It’s dawning – above ground.
We watched the first trapped miner rise to light,
and marveled at the cable and the wheel,
how mountain might release essential night
to rebirth, on TV – as good as real.
We marveled at the cable and the wheel
a world of nations rigged to save a man
to rebirth, on TV as good as real,
and 32 besides. The footage ran –
a world of nations rigged to save a man.
But eyes grow weary, we gave up the watch,
and 32 besides. The footage ran
without us, engineering notch by notch.
Our eyes grew weary. We gave up the watch
and went to bed with prayers for 32
without us. Engineering, notch by notch;
a wife’s brave smile; the sleepless rescue crew –
who’d go to bed, with prayers for 32,
while mountains might let loose essential night?
A wife’s brave smile, the sleepless rescue crew
watching the last trapped miner rise to light.
If i could, I’d veil the earth
And keep it far without your view,
I’d wrap its bulk and hide its shape.
But that would be a waste of time.
Your eyes are those that see the depths
Of the deepest bluest seas.
I look around and feel so grieved
By what I see on mother Earth.
Are these the beings you meant to save?
Their steps have left the golden path.
The congregation you so loved,
Has had indeed a twisted turn:
I see an alter, two men then,
And then I see a priest clad in white,
Hands stretched out in your name,
For man and man to live as one:
Blasphemy is their heritage
From Pharisees of long ago.
They’ve sold the rod you gave to them
To guide your sheep to fields of green,
And took instead their fill of gold,
To get themselves more robes and gems.
Are these the ones you left to lead?
Their every deed profanes your name!
The fragile brand you took from man
Prattles much about her place.
They top their men and bring discord.
The rules you gave on modesty,
Are just as right as purple skies.
The sacredness of two as one
Is all around the busy streets,
And everyone can get a piece,
Except, of course, their purse be dry.
Our consciences are in our bags,
We know no boundaries in our minds.
I see a door, I see ten bolts,
That veil landlords like refugees
From those to whom all wealth belongs.
The touch of gold, so smooth and good,
Has bought the consciences of men,
And turned us all into miners,
Miners on the devil’s mine!
THE MINER’s TEAR
With a blackened finger he points and fears
This terrible day of four hundred tear’s
Young mothers, wives and brides to be
Their loved ones smile once more to see.
Who will they bring from this hell?
Deeper than the drinking well.
Young David? Just a boy you know!
Or old man Bryn with son in tow?
A massive blast a wind that burns
With all their heart they run and turn.
The smell of gas came much too late
That spark of light that sealed their fate.
The men and boys of the colliery
No more nights of life to see
Now laying cold in a saddened grave
For our comfort their lives they gave
We will not forget you Brave men of coal
Risking your life in that deepest hole
You will always be here in our dreams ,
Risking it all on Welsh coal seams.
Form:
The union-management talks reach stalemates in their sessions.
Our representatives are attempting to gain concessions.
If we do not obtain better working conditions and a pay hike,
we see no other alternative but to go on strike.
On the slopes of Olympus Mons, we descend underground.
Inside this mine, deposits of titanium can be found.
If we go further, we can find gold and platinum.
In abundance are other metals like silver and palladium.
There are large untapped veins we can easily see.
Industries on Earth have been grateful for their discovery.
As a result, market prices for commodities have gone down.
Our location has been a booming Martian mining town.
The way the management has treated us has been pitiful.
It seems as if they are discourteous and ungrateful.
Despite dim light in the day, and subzero temperatures at night,
I have every belief in what we are doing is right.
Homeward bound in the evenings, weary miners cross the ridge
Returning from the deep mines black as the coal they uncover
Not far from the grandeur of the New River National Gorge Bridge
Homeward bound in the evenings, weary miners cross the ridge
Generations of these men have considered it a privilege
To dig deep into the latest rich seams of coal they discover
Homeward bound in the evenings, weary miners cross the ridge
Returning from the deep mines black as the coal they uncover.
written May 20, 2021
Unrepentant Miners
I look out over what should have been viridian fields
Where daisy and dandelions
Found their picturesque beauty
Wild and free
I felt the meadow of summer skies
Lay their heads beneath your bare feet
To kiss at your ankles with their secrets
Wild and free
I saw the written verses
Your laughter in April dales of rain
Beneath a willow tree you came to me
Wild and free
I heard you dance on dewdrops
From gentle hills to mountain heights
You pirouette in my eyes
Pirate of my sighs
Wild and free
…………………..but the wealth of your heart
is a treasured prize
to another gluttonous search for gold
unrepentant miners gouge
excavate your beauty
to an open cast
terraces dug deeper than the scars
and though it hurts to see
your dream piled like so much unwanted earth
still given time
in your own clouds of love
those bright yellow flowers
lift up the heads again
but still they search for the precious of you
they couldn’t see and never will
they claw at your soul
for riches they just can’t understand
and think a balm of shovelling it all back
you might grow again for them
they just don’t know that the dusty roads
have trampled you there
Wild and free
I touched the meads of winter skies
Lay their icicles beneath your feet
To kiss on your eyes with their secrets
Wild and free
I saw the unwritten pages
Your joy in the hidden streams
There beneath the willow tree when you came to me
Wild and free
And I watched you sing with lightning
From the echoed prowess of your storm
You dazzle in my eyes
The sweet pirate of my sighs
Wild and free
…………………………..but to them your heart is a mine
open and cast with the scars
they are just too greedy to see
they think in the fields
where your treasures dwell
just iron and steel to build their world
and leave you a pit
to get on with your life
any way you can
I look out over your verdant fields
Where daisy and dandelions fall like gems
Found their prophetic serenity
Wild and free
The watcher on her porch, alone,
Where Fortune lived in days bygone,
She knows the stories; knows the names
Of all the miners and their claims.
She came out here a slip of four
Calling it home for ninety more.
Shotgun in hands, she rocks her chair,
Guarding the miners and their claims.
She waits for packrats, dawn to dusk,
Who’d cart her town off brick and board,
Taking the markers of her life
With all the miners and their claims.
She loved too well the life that flamed
To say goodbye and limp away
Down dusty streets where whirlwinds play
‘Round all the miners and their claims.
The secrets of the sage-clad hills
Are safely stored inside her head;
Beyond the reach of stranger’s probes
Of all the miners and their claims.
Behind her vague blue eyes, she dreams
Her dreams of better days to come,
When smiling Fortune comes back home
To all the miners and their claims.
1977 BRIDGE SITE MINER`S BLUES.
Down in old south Brisbane,
where the derro`s do hang out,
Where the pipes were stacked 6 high,
the homeless camped about.
I was working mate as a miner,
on a new railway bridge site,
They lived in pipes on different floors,
All colours black and white.
Our crane would pick up with style,
one of these fifty meter pipes,
That were used to sleeve the piles,
into the solid rock so tight.
Oh each derro screamed when you picked his up,
and offered sure to fight.
These quarters were too cramped,
just a meter wide inside ,
The metho soaks inside they camped,
they hadn't any pride.
Down a hundred foot hole I`d be shafted sent,
in a 12 gallon bucket too be sure,
By air winch the bucket lower went,
dropped me down to level the floor.
The claustrophobic atmosphere,
could give your heart a wrench,
When the roof fell in fifty feet above,
the shaft my bones did drench.
My bucket rose up with me
my life had seemed was through
Through a yard of mud and rock we climbed to see
the sky so very blue.
No more to go down narrow shafts,
my mining days are spent,
I was ankle deep in mud that time,
when the bucket up it went.
I sprang up more than 7 feet,
from the muddy bottom floor,
Caught my rising bucket seat,
rose up from near deaths door .
Almost buried early....
Sponsor Joe Flach
Contest Name A Dilemma
On the peaks of Mount Logan, I mushed our tobogan
Heading for Dawson and spring
As I camped in the Yukon,the memories of Tuscon
Were bright unforgetable things
The Klondyke had gold, but im fast growing old
And the prospecting fields have gone dead
So I traded these shallows, of cut throats and gallows
For soft feathered pillows, and soft feathered beds.
Its been more than a decade since Dougie and I made
A bargain while toiling for gold
We both had the notion, the wild Artic Ocean
Held more than the frost and the cold
In the short Yukon Basin, we spent nights and days in
The search for a strike and a dream
He was never a quitter, but in tempratures bitter
He died for the glitter, he died for the gleam.
I knelt down beside him, just as his God cried him
His pulse hardly beating at all
He whipspered and begged, that his bones would be laid
Far away from the frost and the cold
As he passed me his poke, his pump stumbled and broke
And I knew he'd been begging for trust
So the promise I made HIM, I never betrayed him
I carried and laid him, in peace, in the dust.
In DAWSON I gave you a home
A green plot of land, with your name on a stone
Although its not much, it's the end of the search
The promise I made you, a debt I repaid you
I carried and laid you,Through blizzards and storms
To DAWSON and gave you a home.