The remembering business
Today a truth was decided, | | Like marching ghosts, we rip
seven centuries ago, that | | pages out of ourselves to tell you
bread and wine could be | | all is well, that we won’t be the
more than the best of us, | | future trapped in these trenches,
the closest we can be to God. | | where the mud of ambition,
But we never remember | | power, mulches into memory.
blood transforms borders, | | Peace has a pulse too,
never our natures. | | it is skittering into a silence.
Rishi Dastidar’s poetry has been published by the Financial Times, Tate Modern and the Southbank Centre amongst many others, and was most recently in Ten: The New Wave (Bloodaxe, 2014). A fellow of The Complete Works, he was longlisted in the 2016 National Poetry Competition and his debut collection Ticker-tape will be published by Nine Arches Press in March 2017. He is a consulting editor at The Rialto magazine, a member of Malika’s Poetry Kitchen, and also serves as a trustee of writing development charity Spread The Word. Twitter @BetaRish
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