Poetry Lingers

Safety In Numbers

One dark day
A virus came to shatter our nation’s health
Lockdowns occurred and advisers spoke
Passing judgements linked to our wealth
When seventy percent are vaccinated
Business will resume
So three out of ten of us may die
But it’s worth the risk we assume
We must learn to face the pain of existence
There is always a risk in living
Death is forever a part of life
While the market’s unforgiving
So marshal your ranks you freedom seekers
Don’t trouble to count the cost
If those fellow humans aren’t allowed to die
Our trading options will be lost
Therefore dear friends though the virus encumbers
For the market’s sake, there’s safety in numbers

Pills

Feeling gloomy, melancholy, dejected?
Mood in the lower depths?
There’s a pill for it
Tending to misbehave as a child?
Finding it hard to listen and daydream a lot?
Declare an ADHD emergency and get a pill for it
Feeling stupid with exams approaching?
Try a smart pill before it’s too late
Putting on too much weight?
Don’t trouble about your diet
Just put your faith in a weight loss pill
And that will keep you quiet
But wait a minute; what’s this?
Only last night I had the strangest dream
A new era was in it to change our world
In the realm of dreams, there it was – all to do with pills
If you were driven by inhumane greed
A pill would give you compassion
And when belief in science went to seed
A pill would put doubt out of fashion
Should you promote the folly of war
A capsule would make you hate harm
When it comes to asylum if you shut the door
It’s a vaccine of welcome for your arm
Should you gain power as an arrogant liar
A serum would foster the truth
For the apathetic who would never inquire
A pastille would foster proof
What a world of fantasy this was!
Where the offbeat becomes the norm
But suddenly I woke
And back to the real world I came
Into the usual mire of self deception
Ready to pay my next pharmacy bill once more
O yes and there’s money in that
Vast fame and fortune for some

Asylum

Asylum is a frantic need
Imposed on desperate people
Through no fault of their own
Indeed it is often a consequence
Of another person’s crime
What more can be said
When your home’s wrecked by fear and death?
Australia fair
Is a wondrous place
Where life is routinely safe
And days are always gently calm
For both the goose and the gander
But alas where refugees tend to meet harm
With a door tighter shut than Uganda
Can you hear the cries of tomorrow
Where historians judge our humanity
And we will be seen as pedlars of sorrow
In support of political inanity?

One Kind Deed

One kind deed can ring around the earth
Echoing in the hallways of time
Here is a tale showing what help is worth
With an outcome close to sublime
An unnamed man was given one day
A humble postage stamp
It let him send a letter away
To another person’s camp
That other friend was on the run
Desperately needing advice
On things that had to be done
The letter came and in a trice
The recipient sprang into action
The knowledge it gave to him of science
Was in no way a fatal attraction
But truth’s golden new alliance
The recipient had found a mould
That had very funny behaviour
And one of the things we are told
Was with germs it became our saviour
As the world’s first antibiotic
Now that letter writer’s behaviour
With wisdom was symbiotic
It was one of the vital causes
That helped science function apace
To create vast human resources
Of penicillin for the human race

Here Is The News

Australia
Cannot make cars any more
But we can make nuclear submarines
All that we need now is war
You can tell that to the marines
So let us bend our backs to the cause
And hustle up a foe
To kindle corporate applause
And prevent industrial woe
Australians all let us rejoice
As we cover our tracks with deception
Let us curse our enemies with angry voice
Give that potent plan a reception
On ever onwards to a better world
We shall dominate other nations
We will rise to glory with our flag unfurled
While our banks receive the donations
O hear this now ye adventurous souls
Our future is in good hands
When the bellicose play such leading roles
And we conquer other lands
To arms! To arms!
Go forward to the slaughter
Our destiny’s controlled with warlike palms
And travels under the water

Rallies

Begone demonstrators
Get off the streets and go home
Your causes are not what they used to be
And turn into useless foam
Once you fought Agent Orange in Vietnam
The lies linked to Iraq oil
Or the slaughter in Afghanistan
Where opium pollutes the soil
Now instead of lockdowns
You would rather let people die
You rally against democracy in the U S of A
Where it’s truth you fiercely deny
You support a dangerous autocrat
Whose aim is purely power
You rally and shout and stamp your feet
To promote his witching hour
So go away the lot of you
Out of public view
Think and read and try to learn
It’s what you need to do
And watch out for the condemnation
Your children will endure tomorrow
As the pages of our history
Detail today’s dark sorrow

royciebaby

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