Name: Valens The Priest by Dylan Ross - Poet
Duration: 7 min 7 s
Description: A collection of poems written and performed in and around the Asker, Bridport. Well not IN, I'd get wet ankles. No, more poems that have been commissioned or inspired by the fine work at Apothecary, Flyign Monkeys, The Lyric, and Grasmere.

A collection of poems written and performed in and around the Asker, Bridport. Well not IN, I'd get wet ankles. No, more poems that have been commissioned or inspired by the fine work at Apothecary, Flyign Monkeys, The Lyric, and Grasmere.

Byway W1/13 Revisited

Valens The Priest

Raising The Standards (With Banners Held High)

You said that you wanted a land fit for heroes,
a place to call home that they’d show off with pride
but somewhere along the way you forgot
the reasons they fought and the reasons they died.

They thought they were fighting for honour and justice,
suppressing the tyrants and saving our land -
but returned to a country that punished the workers
for banding together and making a stand

So your songs are all dirges to the heroically fallen,
your words are all platitudes for their loss of life.
Your actions speak louder than all of your promises,
where lies are pandemic and betrayals are rife

Cause they died in the trenches with promises, hollow,
driving them forward and ringing in their ears
while you pocketed money that should have been spent
making jobs for survivors and easing their fears

Now we march all together and sing for the future,
while honouring those who we lost in the past
and we still want to believe all the promises made
as our young men were slaughtered, dismembered and gassed.

Prosperity offered like chocolate at Christmas.
Peace in our times and everlasting hope -
all that they got were more broken dreams,
more pointless wars, more money for old rope

The bosses got fat on the toil of their workers,
the bankers got fat on their interest rich loans
and the man who came back from the war that he fought in
was treated no better than their graveyards of bones.

So bang the drum comrade and never forget
that if silence is demanded then shout and be loud
and don’t let this government try to sell history
as though it is something for which we should be proud.

A century has passed and they’ve destroyed the mines,
they’ve doused the steel furnaces, grounded the docks,
left northern communities suffering and reeling
in their self proclaimed, privatised school of hard knocks.

There are still poor people living in poverty,
food banks are prevalent, folk on the street,
they cannot look after the homeless and feeble,
the old cannot pay for their lighting and heat.

From the mud of the trenches they came back home
Their future was as grey as the clothes on their back
They demanded we give them something to cling to
 A future of light in their visions of black.

England’s green fields, the red of the blood,
The gold we were promised, the blue of the sky
These are the colours we raise as our standard
Marching together, with Banners Held High.

BARD COMPANY: RAISING THE STANDARDS (WITH BANNERS HELD HIGH) [DEMO]

Performance Poet, with a punky thing happening at times. Poet, Mumbler, Shouter, Bedroom Producer, occasional Musician, currently pretending to a be a Novelist.

Valens The Priest

Dylan Ross - Poet

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