(Written in response to the documentary Britain’s Nuclear Bomb Scandal; Our Story)
The washing on the line rotting / tattered flags. Of bonhomie from behind protection. Still in denial / gaslighting. A blot, a blight. The government has still not met the veterans, the victims. It talks instead of patriotism, migration, and flags. It talks of flags. Of flags. Old stoics, or so it seemed. Truth and (multiple) lesions revealed. The myriad miscarriages mentioned. And one of justice – down the generations. Unacknowledged. That will not heal (until… or even then). Twisting facts and physiques. Deformities rare, but collected here, in abundance. Other countries, albeit reluctantly, concede complicity and compensate. The proud UK waves flags and waits for (guinea pig) servicemen to die. I remember Iraq – we must not march while ‘our boys’ were in action / doing service – we were told. Our older, forgotten ‘boys’ were sent through mushroom clouds regardless. Betrayal? Where / which is the real betrayal? Fallout and flags, Of knowing the land and feeling the damage. Visceral. As the white world cannot. Poisoned atolls, islands and outback(s), Dead babies in remote Australia. The land declared safe for the indigenous people(s) to return. One of so many falsehoods, derelictions, and travesties. The Official Secrets Act broken to scotch that lie / to save their lives. A gap in the history books. The heat. The chill of image. Like being microwaved, he said. Shadows on the X-Ray – generations on. As brave men wept. Septic the dialogue. Pathetic the flags.
© 2025 Stephen C. Middleton
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