The Mulberry Bush

I walked past when
men in chain and leather coats
clerked infamy
on the faces of the chosen
Huddled in groups
watching
horses tied to trees and posts
Ears pricked to the cymbal clank-
wafer thud on doors
a death peal pounding
Branching through the hollow halls

We winced as they braced the door
Counting out an abacus
of small conceits
on the chains of broken out beasts
Fear and dread
Left our own clothes red
Pierced by centuried insanities
To gasp as they bled the host.
The night air rent
with feral consequence

Our part in outrage
The conceivable bound
of profane logic
Mixed in flood of innocence
Bruised fruit-a-blighting
Bleeding the very air
A sacrifice no wound can stem
or salt the flow but our own
inanities and mistruth. Pilgrims
sporting ribbons and regrets
Badges we knew, perhaps
we should have worn

* It was said that the Knights who murdered Thomas à Becket tied their horses to a Mulberry Bush prior to killing him.

** The Mulberry Bush was one of two pubs blown up by the IRA in 1974 killing 21 people and injuring 182 others. It also led to one of the worst miscarriages of justice in recent British history when 6 innocent men - the Birmingham Six - were jailed for the attack.