Orders descend like sharpened hail
each shard cutting language to ribbons.
We learn to swallow pain quietly,
to bow our eyes before the flag of silence.
Walls do not need ears...
fear builds its own cathedral,
where every heartbeat kneels
to the god of obedience.
Children are taught to trace straight lines,
never to bend them back into loops.
Curves are forbidden
too dangerous a hint
that what dies might begin again.
Even breathing is tallied,
counted like coins in the dark.
Still, a single breath slips past.
Unmeasured, unowned
a secret chord that rattles
the cage of silence.
From that small ignition,
the world remembers how to grow.
be warmed be aware to those who mock the lord
the rules and regulations are there for a reason not scare
to those who believe be warned the weather has changed earth will quake
be sure take cover of forced to swim for the sea will come in and take what it wants by force repent while you can the laws change your world and state 5 or more people having the same dream same vesion no turning back tsunamis earthquakes even fires that are showing god's warning you heed the preacher i sent! came back to me where there's still time i will yet save you from this coming disaster
She was the rain
He was the thunder
And together they were an unstoppable storm
Both activists in their own form
Both doing what they were made for
A duo who held a power that could destroy A system
Meant only to break them
Built to control them
Her voice was fire
Loud and unforgiving
His mind was like ice
Cold and calculated
She was outspoken
She lead the protests
Whilst he wrote the speeches
This was their dynamic
This made the racist world panic
And that's exactly what they wanted
They knew their power
They knew what triggered their envy
They knew the secret to unlock their weakness
And that was their blackness
So together they openly loved themselves
They knew it would cause them to become overwhelmed
Something they couldn't take
So instead they decide to hate
To mask their envy
To repress their inferiority
And replace it with false superiority
To hide their insecurities
For as long as we love our blackness
It will forever be our shield To protect us
From the darkness that lurks within the racists
Who will forever burn in their hatred
And scarred By jealousy
A district in the south
On the coastline it has graced
Is a well established charter
Ancient roots from which it’s based
The symbol of the city
Placed on the Corporation seal
That Latin script around the edge
Enshrines the common weal
A pair of towers at the Port
Consolidate the fort
Allowing commerce to flow forth
For there’s more tea to import
The glowing harbour waves
Drift in from the sea
They travel under bridges
Along the River Lee
Few today remember well
It was on a sunny June day
When this city seal was embraced
By the martyred JFK
Least we not forget
The motto that is his
Invoked now, forever more
‘Statio Bene Fida Carinis’
They mistook her silence for softness.
But beneath that stillness,
the ground was shifting.
She wasn't snow–
she was the mountain before it breaks.
She held her tongue like a fuse,
every word a spark she wasn't ready to let go.
Not yet.
She didn't scream–
she shimmered.
Until the heat in her lungs became truth,
until the truth was too molten to hold.
And when it came out,
it wasn't a whisper.
It was lava–
raw, red, unstoppable.
Every step she took melted the lies beneath her feet.
They called it anger.
They called it destruction.
But she called it survival.
She didn't burn to destroy –
she burned to be seen.
To be heard.
To remind the world that even quiet girls
can set the earth on fire.
The scars they don't see
Are the ones filled with the most painful memories
The ones you don't have to touch for them to hurt
Our bodies are permanent scars
A reminder of what was once ours
Now the use to start wars
They made it our prison of skin and bones
Condemning us to a life where silence is our home
An eternity of being alone
The scars they don't see
They couldn't have our skin
They couldn't steal our blackness
They didn't want to see us win
They made it their life goal to convince us
Our existence was a sin
It's why we try to be invisible
So they don't use us as a weapon
These are the type of scars
That constantly burn
The ones that yearn
For a life of freedom
For a life we don't have to earn
The ones that don't fade
That can't be tamed
The ones that demand to be named
The ones born from racism
Fueled by discrimination
And continued through oppression
The ones they make to teach us a lesson
If we ever decided to start a rebellion
The ones they carved by the decision
That we were the villains
When in reality their hands were the weapon
Written: June 27, 2025, for contest: Sponsored by: Tania Kitchin
*************
Mirage suggested on the run
"Hydrate or be well-done, my son"
The ice cream rebelled,
The sunflowers yelled—
And the night couldn't outshine the sun!
They locked her in a box of gold,
with chains that shimmered, stories told.
"Stay pretty, still–don't ask for more,
The fire in you? Just folklore".
she smiled like myths were make–believe,
But hid a flame beneath her sleeve.
each breath she took was kindling slow,
A furnace marked in ash and glow.
The saw her feathers, red and bright,
But clipped her wings do dim her light.
"You burn too loud", they used to say,
"And blaze is not the woman way".
Yet silence cracks, and embers bite –
she burst the cage in blaze and flight.
Not tamed, not torn, not anyone’s—
she rose to kiss forbidden suns.
Now when they speak her name in fear,
It echoes loud and crystal clear:
You cannot cage what’s born to rise
A phoenix lives in ashes's guise
~hira~
The Sun forgot to rise one day,
and never came again.
The stars blinked out like dying sparks–
the world went cold, and then...
the silence grew, the stories died,
and no one dared to dream.
But deep beneath the weight of dark,
inside a cave unknown,
one ember breathed–not bright, not bold,
but fiercely on its own.
It had the last of truth and fight,
a warmth that would not go.
It waits for hands not scared of dark,
for hearts that still believe,
It waits for someone brave enough.
to light what none could see,
The world thinks hope is gone for good–
but hope was always heat.
~hira~
Our pleasure is political
Our presence anarchy
Our smile a rebellion
Our hair A revolution
Our blood our fire
Our blackness A force to be reckoned with
Our joy to them is a declaration of war
Our resilience an act of political warfare
Our resilience a threat to the system of oppression they built
They don't like when we take back control
Then turn it into freedom
Their existence is threatened
By how we embrace our blackness
They can't handle when we love
Being black
Because its something they can't
Have
Be
Or steal
No matter how hard they try
Their envy betrays them
Every time they oppress us
Kill us
Target us
When they discriminate us
They know the only way they can feel superior
Is by trying to make us feel inferior
That's Our power
Joy and laughter
You would pardon insurrection -freedom to mob, good people; while pouring ICE on immigration -Free rides National Guarded
Rebellion
Breached
Vigilante
Patriotism
Rebellion
Protest
Discontent
Nonviolent
Rebellion
While pouring ICE on immigration
Free rides -National Guarded, you would pardon insurrection -freedom to mob, good people
My heart The voice
Each beat a chant
Refusing to be silenced
Each beat getting louder
An act of defiance
It would not be quiet
Our skeleton
The foundation
The vessel which carried the rebellion
It's the ground that doesn't crumble
Even as we march
It doesn't take the attention
It remains humble
Knowing that it was not bigger than the movement
The blood is the strength
It doesn't let it rest
It is the breath of each footstep
It is the fuel of the movement
The bloodstream carries the fire
Throughout the body ensuring we never tire
The stomach feeds the protest
With words of encouragement
Echoes Throughout the body
And bleeds from our mouth
You can't put us down
Our skin Our shield
To show we won't yield
Our representation
Of everything we are fighting for
To let them know out blackness
Is something we are proud of
After all being black is the definition of greatness
If soil could complain-
if air could sign,
if Earth could weep,
and if humanity could truly speak
of what it has done to itself.
They would recount quite wounds,
buried in silence,
echoes stifled by times,
memories sealed away,
folded within like secrets-
the world refused to hear.
But silence is not peace,
it is a storm held in the lungs,
a scream never given voice.
And if one day -
someone dared to listen, truly listen-
To the grief that was never spoken,
they should be overcome by guilt,
They would fall beneath it's weight.The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award
One of our only protectors
The sun burns their skins
With the reminder of their sins
The sun kisses our skin
Gifting it with affection
The wind echoes with our ancestors stories
A silent act of justice
A way to honour black history
To haunt the guilty
The wind lifts our heads up
To remind us
That they can't break us
And that it will always avenge us
The fire ignites us
To empower us
To speak up
It gives us our voice to show them we won't shut up
They can't stop us
Our fire burns through their hatred of blackness
But for us
It gives us our confidence
The ocean our biggest protectors
Freed us
From a lifetime of punishment
It saved us
And buried us
Then made sure our pain wasn't forgotten
It gave us our salvation
A different form of justice
The soil has tasted our blood
Carried our burdens
And held our broken bodies
It has drowned in our tears
And cried to our prayers
Obedience is a spell.
But some bloodlines
carry thunder in their sleep.
They will call it rebellion.
But it is remembering -
the heartbeat beneath the ruin,
the fire before the name,
before the world was trained
to forget its own divinity.
Before the myths bent truth into control -
there were those
who shaped stars with their breath
and did not ask permission.
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