Keep Calm
and have an ordinary day,
boxed files
with history are waiting to meet us.
Yellowing papers
carefully catalogued
into a silence.
Do Not Disturb
the collection’s sleeping conscience.
Leaders chosen,
most carefully selected,
to win at all costs
and profit.
Keep the home fires burning,
it’s alright it’s a job
maim and destruction
shilling a week, yes, just a bob.
You see,
the most intellectual, honorary gentlemen
have devised
Royal Society chemical recipes to burn out their eyes.
It’s alright it’s a job,
TNT into shells without any protection,
that costs too much mate,
while the men on the front
cost nothing at all,
they’ll only last for four minutes,
in blood, guts and squall,
most terribly inconvenient
a rifle shortage for a huntsman’s ball.
Returning documents to archive,
they have to be weighed
just a few grams evaporating,
that’s OK,
but everything else must stay the same.
The economy of despots and madness,
still remains,
our heritage, our history
written and shelved
quiet the pain.
Please dismiss any attempt
at researcher’s remorse,
comments will be moderated
and later stored,
archived as sanity
feelings ignored.
These words are too heavy,
please take them away.
Keep calm,
and I hope
you have a most unusual day.
Michelle Thomasson 21.03.14
Reading 'Archived': https://soundcloud.com/michelle-thomasson/archived-a-poem-by-michelle-thomasson-recorded-by-on-the-record
On behalf of the research for CAAT and On The Record "Arming all Sides” and the Arms Trade in World War 1: http://armingallsides.on-the-record.org.uk/case_studies/shells-shells-and-more-shells/
Photo kindly supplied from the Cheltenham Local History Society: