25th November 2022

I wrote this poem in 2015 during the height of the war in Syria. The war in Ukraine has been the defining event of this year, and as we draw closer to Christmas, it felt right to share this poem. You can also watch me perform the poem here:

There will be bombing on this Christmas night

Bright bursts of flames that fall from greater heights

Flying planes that move quick and out of sight

There will be bombing on this Christmas night

Mothers will cry on this evening of cheer

As the shouts of gunfire ring out clear

Death is now moving in the atmosphere

Do tell, will peace on earth ever draw near?

Fathers cry out in the new morning sun

Run children, run, before the devil comes

He will beat your chest and dry out your lungs

Your heart will stop and your blood cease to run  

Lo and behold the violence that has spread

How it bleeds the poor of water and bread

Steals all their life and leaves only the dead

Their distant dreams lost in their distant heads

Tired and thirsty, and covered in mud

The children swim through the rivers of blood

The whole nation is consumed in this flood

While in their ears a pounding: thud, thud, thud 

The cold battles hard once the day is done

It can’t be like this: surely help will come?

All they asked Santa for was Christmas fun

But instead he brings terror, fear and guns

As the moon and stars shine bright in the sky 

All the little children shiver and cry

They feel so confused and need to know why

They have been abandoned and left to die

As the snowflakes fall and the stars shine bright

No silent nights were to be had that night

And a child asks with his last breath of life

Why is there bombing on this Christmas night?