Violent Verse

by Paul Tristram

I carry the scars
emotional, physical
and ones of memory.
The stitches, the blood,
broken bones and bruises.
The pain and the aching,
the stinging and burning.
Singing aloud that ‘Violent Verse’
with a chorus of courtrooms,
prison or death lay that way.
I have been to one a few times
The despair, the adrenalin,
the fighting and quarrelling.
I’m not ready for the other yet.
I leave the ‘Violent Verse’ behind
for I have seen the light
and am now singing a happier song.