You Decide On A Title

Privatisation

It is a plan
Made with élan
To let the greedy
Take from the needy
So a get rich clique rules
By selling cheaply our jewels
As life goes on at a furious pace
Completely at the mercy of the market place
It is a scheme
With a sinister theme
To sell what is treasured as ours
Like a commonplace bunch of flowers
So that people all suffer an injurious loss
And have their lives governed by a corporate boss
It is a blow
For those in the know
To strike it rich at fever pitch
And make a profit without a hitch
From something that once was owned
By the common people who are thus dethroned
It is a shame
To impose this game
And change all the owners
Into the malnourished loners
Who endure unjust financial pain
From a cheating investor’s unfair gain
Not one politician can be deemed to be wise
By dealing and conniving with a plan to privatise

A Vociferous Crowd

Listen to them
Hurling abuse at that player
Like a mob at a munera*
Angry voices
Mutilating the air with a violent cacophony
Echoing in playing fields with a malevolence
Irrelevant to the accepted ethics of cricket
It is a kind of herd mentality
Linked to the free market where winning
Is essential
And losing is a disgrace leading to penury
That is the way of sport these days
A spectacle created
And shaped by media bosses
Whose prime purpose in life is to sell
Who generate interest
By creating tensions
Playing around with people’s feelings about power
On a battlefield without guns
Where heroes are worshipped
And failures evoke appropriate ignominy
Created by the conjurors who shape the commentary scripts
They tell us all this is for the good of the game
A way of living
Based on sporting achievement
A healthy lifestyle and noble entertainment
So it’s play up play up and play the game
And watch the money roll in
On the playing fields not of Eton but of bedlam

• A Roman gladiatorial contest

Money

Money is the route of all evil
It is the pathway schemers use
On their journeys of iniquity
Into power
It fulfils so often invidious dreams
When you have it
This potent tool
Chimeras become reality…
As a measure of value
And means of exchange
It gives you an influence
That creates social status
If you have enough of it
You can shape the world
Interpret reality
Determine government policy
Define acceptable mores
Achieve a destiny shaped by amenable lawyers
Sing songs of praise with banks
Start wars with weapons you create as income
Buy compliant media
To spread your chosen mythology
And shape the lives of the underprivileged
Go then
You poverty stricken failures
You insignificant vassals of the lucrative empire
Learn your lessons
Change your ways
There are things to be done now
Buy a ticket on the money train wherever it is for sale
And learn as you earn
There are no more things in heaven and earth
Than pounds, shillings and recompense

Once Upon A Time

Once upon a time something happened
It was an interesting event
Important in its own way
The kind of thing that is often ignored
In a world frequently troubled with non sequiturs
An event that can slip by unnoticed
Especially if you are preoccupied with important matters
Such as who won the Fourth Test at Old Trafford
Or what is the latest price of oil shares
So there it was
Not a declaration of war
Not an earthquake
Not a crash on the stock market
Not a fresh outbreak of a pandemic
Not the death of a queen
Nothing of such world-shattering significance
No misdemeanour to anger the gods
No revolution
No reformation
Just a stereotypical event
No, prototypical
Yet clearly not quintessentially archetypal
Indeed the opposite…
A right honourable member
Simply told the truth
And thereby won an election

Imaginary Demon

What would you do with a political demon
Should one exist?
A reprobate?
A rogue?
A black hat?
Who breaks the law with extreme skill
And has become richer than Croesus
A leader of men
A master with chicanery
With a band of followers who see no wrong
In his evil schemes
And misbehave
In any way he chooses
Whenever he incites them?
What if
He had a formula to win support
Inventing fables
To sway the minds of his followers
And lead them to the disruption of their world?
What if
Chaos
Discord
Cataclysm
Followed constantly from his manoeuvring
In ways that would delight the monocrats of the past?
The answer is clear:
We would strive to end his influence
Casting aside his dark intentions
His megalomania
His grandioseness
His delusions of grandeur…
How lucky we are
That such a hellhound exists
Nowhere but in the fantasies of a poetic page

royciebaby