Locked and loaded

by Stuart McFarlane / May 10th, 2026

We’re locked and loaded;
you guys’ve goaded
us for long enough.

We’re weary of you;
and now we are through
heeding all your guff.

You’ll give in somehow;
and so I can vow
it’s gonna get rough.

Can’t you see it’s done?
We’ve already won.
Don’t you grasp this stuff?

You idly presume,
and wrongly assume,
we’ll run out of puff.

But we’ll take a cruise
round the strait of Hormuz;
your threats we’ll rebuff.

Things will get scary;
be very wary
of calling our bluff.

If we burn the sky,
and a million die,
well that is just tough.

Stuart McFarlane has spent many years, both abroad and in the UK, teaching English. In the UK this mainly involved teaching Esol to refugees and asylum seekers. He is now semi-retired and so can devote more time to writing poetry. He has had poems published in local magazines and online publications such as 'Borderless Journal', based in Malaysia and 'Culture Matters' and 'The Recusant', based in the UK. Read other articles by Stuart.

This article was posted on Sunday, May 10th, 2026 at 8:00am and is filed under Poetry.