???

Where is it? Where is it? Where is that which is lost?
Where is that which should dwell at the center of us?
Where is it? Where is it? How could it be gone?
How is it the hearth is lost from the home?
How that the women know not to make bread ?
Have the forgotten the words that their grand mothers said?
How have the men lost the kindling of flame?
The ways of the wilds,their forefathers names?
Where will we find for us such as we need ?
To pass to our children a solid belief ,
In moonlight and magic in love and joy,
impart to them skills that their lives can employ
In the mending and making that needs must be done.
How goes the salvage the righting of wrongs?

Where is it? What is this? How could this be?
The cageing of skies and the slaughter of trees!
What is it ? What is it? What madness is this?
What malady rages? What sickness persists?
Where are the mindful? Where are the sages?
What of the temples, the wisdom of ages?

Where are all the open spaces?
What of all the sacred places?
What of flowers?
What of seeds?
Of virgin lands?
Of open seas?

Where have all the forests gone?
And what about the summer sun?
No longer kind but burns my skin
And food that poisons,
Everything,
Seems lost and broken
What is there now to have hope in?
What is there now to believe?
What now left that still runs free?
What is truth and what is lies
Must be known to recognise
That which endures and is divine,
From that, which is a waste of time.

Who has the blueprint? Who rights the signs the signs?
Who makes the healing? Who knows of the time
For living and dying for futures and pasts?
Will the dust of our journey bring us home at last?

Where are all the safety nets?
The gurantees the safer bets?
Where are all the easy routes, the shortcuts
Where are all the loops?
To guide us through the cities maze
To lead us to those halcyon days
Where we will never want again
Nor feel the cold
Nor see the pain
Who is it nurtures the talents required
Who gains the knowledge for us to reach higher

What are our ways
And where are our means
For the making of health
And the reading of dreams?
How lies our life
And what is our worth
In the measure of time
We walk on the earth?
Who distils tinctures?
Who cures the herbs?
Who has the cunning?
Who knows the words?
Who sings the dream time?
Where are the guides?
Who'll teach the children
The ways of the tribe?
Who speaks with the beasts?
Who charts the skies?
Who keeps the stories
Awake and alive?
Where are the seasons
That keep us in step?
Who is it knows
Where our heirlooms are kept?
Where are the Old Ways
The tales of the wives?
Who makes the matches?
How will we survive
If the customs and teachings
Are fallacies, pride?
Are the touches of secrets
Now lost from our hands?
Are the herds struck dumb
All hope lost to the lands?
Are our people all weeping
In fear and in loss?
If we can't find our way
At what price, at what cost
Will we fumble in darkness
Mistaken and sad
In the tragic belief
That the best has been had?
For infernal ages
Grow ugly and bland.
Learn nonsense, wreak havoc
Consume in our sleep.
Squander the gifts
That we have in our keep.
Will the ways of the world?
Become hungry and vile
Will our spirit be taken
With profit and style?
Does the work of our lives
Gentle our world?
Are the words that we speak
Of a kind to be heard?
Is there love in the justice?
Are there winners in wars?
Is there guilt in our knowing?
Will anyone pause?

Our history’s seeds
Have been spent in rough sowing
Our sense has been battered
Through labelling and owning
Our people are scattered
Our customs forgotten
The fruit of our loins
Grow up twisted and rotten
Our homes have been raided
Our blood has been spilled
What is it? What is it? That will comfort these ills?
Where is the remedy for the blight of the ages
What of the bards and the seers and the mages
Who are the hero's
What chance have we got
To seek out and to savour that, which is lost.