A Welsh Coal Mines web page

THE GUITAR
(A poem about the Spanish Civil War)

We drank of our delight
Under the star-curved sky
In the lamplit glow, and, somewhere beyond the edge of time
I hear you sigh and your back arched
As the guitar climaxed
Smelled your fragrance and tasted of your salt
The guitar quickened to exalt sense beyond reason
In the pulse of passion we reached ecstacy
The priest and candle could not be ours
Bombs and slaughter brought us no laughter
The guitar played phrenetically and the bombs dropped on
Guernica, Madrid...
On protagonists and prisoners in fascist anarchy
I fought with peasants and witness the slaughter of your nation
The passion of our music still heard - remembered
The rose you gave I kept

BERYL RICHARDS 

PAUL
(A poem about Paul Robeson)

A man, Black, magnificent,
the descendent of the Ibo
Whose ancestry,
made redundant by slave
Sodden greed

STOOD ALONE IN HIS DIGNITY
WORDLESS AGAINST PREJUDICE AND DOGMA

His parents,
transported to a foreign place

Bred him to respect his proud
heritage in a world possess by hatred of his colour

SINGING!

Lyrically savage,
stabbing heart and spirit
Spanning cultures and prejudice

His talent!  His torment!
Universal chords touching conscience
with anger and guilt

 THAT SUCH A MAN,
Alone, and Black
Could provoke feelings of hate and cowardice
With convoluted simplicity and controversy
Exposing the sick under belly of our tyranny and corruption
hidden in the soft whispers of our poverty ridden thoughts

BERYL RICHARDS