THE TOWERS OF LIES – a modern and true take on Remembrance Sunday

THE TOWERS OF LIES – a modern and true take on Remembrance Sunday 

Don’t put my name on a tower of sighs,
where young folks were slaughtered
for old rich men’s lies.
Don’t carve it neat in your marble and steel —
no stone for heroes can sanctify this dread deal.

Don’t put my name on your daylight’s mean screen,
your pixel-poppies, your “never again” meme.
You grieve in fake filters, hashtags, and trends,
while the next war readies, just round our bends.

Don’t put my name in your Sunday parade,
where brass bands wail for the debts left unpaid.
The drums still beat, the orders still fly —
we still march in circles while more young boys die.

Faux-grieving suits and plastic tears,
selling peace with souvenir beers.
Who will provide for me and for mine,
when they drag me from the streets
and force me to the line?

Don’t put my name beneath all your dread drones,
 your data gods, your buzzing phones.
 No — I will not kneel to your lying gobshites —
for you can’t paint my freedom on a bomb’s guiding sights.

Don’t put my name on a flag half-unfurled,
 while you barter our souls for a bad, broken world.
 When silence falls steep and the church bells cry,
 remember the truth from beneath that tower of a lie.

And when the wind shakes the poppies, 
and spits on the cross,
 and mothers count fingers and weep for their loss,
remember this voice from beneath Britain’s grey skies —
and don’t — don’t you dare — put my name
on a tower of lies.