History – Richard Williams Poetry

Thoughts from Empire’s Home-Port Shore

By Richard | July 31, 2022August 1, 2022 by Richard

Tarnishing and Rust On empire’s home-port shore,an old strength resisting.Lucknow to Sierra Leone,yellow fever to mutiny,marble balm for victories’ loss. A row of forgotten obelisks;lists of salt-seasoned names,of letters that shined like surffused in iron and brass,to seal a collective sigh. But stone flakes into shrapnel, the once hard edges of words,soft and reddening. Metal breaks down and dissolvesinto the reckoning earth. First published in Poetry & All That Jazz (2021) Portsmouth is full of monuments to…

Poetry

HMS Swordfish

By Richard | June 3, 2020June 3, 2020 by Richard

Built in 1932, HMS Swordfish was one of the first batch of S-class submarines to be built. With a normal crew of thirty-six, these were primarily designed for British coastal patrol duties, and as a consequence were smaller and far more vulnerable than later boats (in naval parlance submarines are always known as boats, not ships). Of the twelve that started the war, only three made it to V.E. Day. After eleven relatively uneventful patrols,…

Poetry Random Ramblings

How Easy it is To Make a Ghost

By Richard | May 8, 2020May 8, 2020 by Richard

Today our house is bedecked with flags. A social distancing compliant street party in the afternoon. We have our finger buffet prepared. There will be a quiz. Good natured conversations over garden walls. Maybe some Vera Lynn or big band jazz. It should be fun – and the end of the war in Europe is something to celebrate and remember, despite the attempts at hijacking of anniversaries and national memory by certain individuals and groups…