Hill forts

Sitting on high tumbled ramparts,
grassy domed crater summiting an English hill
where long forgotten battle dead
lie in deep encircling ditches
strange many curled seedpods of Loosestrife
boil up from long grasses.

My mind drifts to mid-Atlantic and volcanic Faial
where people scattered in panic
as deep lake waters drained swirling into the volcano below
afraid that, with magma heating,
the waters would roil back out
destroying all.

Here, in England, emotions roil.
This fort’s tall palisade was
built to defend against the outsider, the other.
Now my country retreats within other palisades
toppling the first domino
to consequence unknown.

Hot gas bubbles seeth up
and through Maria Laach,
the forgotten Rhineland Supervolcano,
bubbling, boiling, at Europe’s heart
unheeded.

Whilst America has elected an arrogant fool
Europe tipple topples into fractions.
Generations have avoided war
yet the great project of Europe
is cracking apart
and the fool given dreadful power
may burn us all.

Hill forts cannot help us now.

The other name for Loosestrife
is Bomb-Weed.

Copyright © 2019 Kim Whysall-Hammond  –a rewrite of an older poem