Royce Levi Australian Teacher and Author

Lies For Sale

How cunning they are
Exploiting human weakness for profit
So images of people guzzling fleshy food
Are visible often
To stir your taste buds and make you spend
Or flashy cars are seen endlessly
Speeding
To promote a sale for the wrong reasons
Or an attractive woman
Offers a drive to an eligible male
And sexuality leads to a purchase
Or Simple Simon gets your attention
By doing something stupid or naive
To foster a deal
Or visual gimmickry batters your eyes
To create the illusion of magical cleanliness
That inspires your investment
Or celebrities are paid vast sums
To pretend they like a product
So we lapdogs will then invest in it
Or conspicuous crowds of fake enthusiasts
Play-act
And all they do is shout a lie to make you buy
Or others exploit the Superman illusion
With counterfeit images of power
To sell petrol
Thus we build unreal visual castles in the air
Utopian deception
To sell mundanity disguised as gold
There you are
Some of the ways the invisible hand
Stirs the hallowed brew of cost effectiveness
Such is life these days
Those are but some of the ways
The market roars
The marketeer triumphs
And life goes on as the deceivers prescribe

Arrant Rogue

Look at you
You have a way with words that persuades non thinkers
You lie constantly, not innocent fibs
But sweeping momentous disturbing untruths
That make your responsive obeisant flock of followers
Love you to the level of reverence
Your way with violence too makes you a deadly iconoclast
An ugly nonconformist
Who leads people astray assiduously for his own benefit
How then do you do this?
Let us count the ways
You are funded by corporations to deny global warming
You exploit racism by decrying immigration
You break the law constantly to increase your profits
You use courtrooms as venues for your own propaganda
You favour politically your own absolute rule
You have a distorted view of history
You wave your arms and clap yourself constantly in public
You imprison children inhumanely for long periods
You reduce or eliminate independent science advisory panels
You refuse assiduously to accept political defeat
You treat international diplomacy with utter contempt
There
Let that suffice for now
Such follies link your leadership to despair
Bring political mores to the edge of a cliff
At the foot of that cliff is dictatorship
Confusion
And chaos for all humanity
So let us chart a new course
Treat roguery with the contempt it deserves
Be alert for integrity
And cast any arrant rogue
Away, away, away
To the other side of awareness

The Climate Curse Still Lingers

Enough!
The climate curse still lingers
Greedy neocon birds of prey still rule the roost
Still supported obeisantly by a government they fund
Cars still convert oxygen into greenhouse gases
Coal still finds a market for a mogul to exploit
Gas is still exported for exorbitant profit
Oil still shapes the destiny of power hungry nations
Still science knocks on many doors and finds no one at home
So loudly consequences scream, seeking our attention
And what then are the outcomes that we need to mention?
Well
Floods have become destructive events again and again and again
Heat waves condemn many old folk to an early grave
Cosmic fires pervade the earth, killing too many we try to save
Storms cause dire destruction and cast aside resistance
Damaged roads and bridges hinder normal existence
Droughts now happen frequently as the rain finds another place
Ground level ozone vapours still threaten the human race
Depression is more common today with post traumatic stress
Famines now grow in number to add to the duress
Heating the sea will bring mercury into the food we eat
Starvation lingers on many doorsteps because of the heat
So wake up now you miscreants who still promote disaster
You must act now so the marketeer will not be our master
Bring wisdom into the lives you harm
Think things through to cast aside alarm
The heat is on and the chance is gone to disregard the analysis
Deniers now will be suffering from a form of mental paralysis
Do it now, discard those mindless ways
So you can comment truthfully on the loveliest of days

Dictator

Well now, just look at you
Mouthing lies and patriotism as a Fascist might
What do you think you are?
The ruler of this land?
Not a bit of it
You are a self promoting wastrel
A liar who defies the law with absolute venom
A nonentity disguised as a significant somebody
A tyrant obsessed with your own grab for power
You persuade people effectively by appealing to their darker nature
Tell tales that appeal to non thinkers
Curse your opponents to bring them into disrepute
With fables and emotional non sequiturs
Your voice is heard because of the colluding media
That love you like a long lost brother
Or rather like a spoilt brat
So
You weave your tapestry of unreality
Your praise of evil and your eulogy of self promotion
Your defiance of valid legal procedures
Your fake claims of injustice directed towards you
Your allegiance drawn from a throng of mindless followers
And your nauseous criminal history about to be exposed
Now the wheels of justice are really turning
Misdeeds have consequences that will catch up with you
Although for you crime pays, a day of judgement is approaching
Your assault on the law is about to fall by the wayside
Your true nature is about to be reckoned with
Justice awaits you
And the knives it wields are very sharp
Your body is about to be exhumed from the graveyard of deceit
And cremated by the fires of fair play
So give the world now the peace it deserves
The one gift you have left to bestow upon us
Your silence

The Sword Of Justice

How dare you; you can’t do that
Treat the law, its judges, and its juries with contempt
Comment aloud during a court session
Abuse the officers of the judicature
And your legal opponents
Then rise and leave with anger amidst the procedures
The law is a sacred thing
Vital to every member of every society
If justice is despised and inoperative at any time
Injustice sponsored by tyranny is but a small step away
Fascism, a reign of terror, totalitarianism, dictatorship
Are possible perils when the law is treated with disrespect
So change your ways you mindless self-promoting dullard
Abandon your disobedience, your waywardness, your defiance
Your ways that endanger the future of mankind
Learn the lessons taught by the ages
Appropriate respect for the timeless sword of justice
The vital icon of civilisation
The common man’s only defence against despotism
The one safeguard for all against enslavement
So change you ways now
Listen to the voice of reason
Follow the advice of the time aware
Who have seen the law grow in strength and significance
Through all the years that history records
If you fail; if you continue your disobedient follies
That sword will smite you asunder
Dismember your disobedient selfish body
Into a thousand pieces of insignificance
And cast them into a chasm of forgotten memories
Your life’s causes will be ended
Your name will be sullied
Your business will be bankrupt
Your politics will shrivel into voteless non existence
And above all else
The law we must respect
Will not be contaminated by your non sequiturs
Away with you then, now
Revise yourself
Or remain forever silent

royciebaby

Pathway To Hell

Revenge is in the air
Punishment for a hostile act that kills
Nothing will be allowed to stand in the way
Of your revenge
Every foe must go
Wipe the slate clean
Civilians are no problem
They are part of the inevitable nemesis
Children too,
Thousands in number
For they are placed by destiny on the other side
Right is might
In this war to bring justice to the chosen
For somewhere amidst all that nameless humanity
The planners of your demise are hiding
So
Blast their hidden sanctuary into non existence
No matter whom you kill
See
The damage that task causes
Amidst the carnage
Dwelling places turned into shapeless rubble
Countless streets with no name mired with wreckage
Yet still the bombs rain down
Deadly memos of hatred without end
Weapons of mass destruction
Yes
Death has no respite here
It has no morality of spirit
And taps on the shoulders of so many innocents
Even the journalists are dying
Doctors too are among the many dead
So walk with me in your mind these troubled alleyways
Step gingerly to avoid the fallen
Or the shattered dreams turned into debris
But do not dwell there
For whatever street you choose
Where e’re you walk
Will be a pathway to Hell

Love In Your Heart

So
You want to face the music
Meet your destiny in this troubled world
With dignity and integrity
So much will depend on what your mind tells you
Are you surrounded by enemies?
Are the people you meet potential foes
Or can you trust them as friends?
Is there a threat from humans who are different?
Muslims? Jews? Indigenous folk? Immigrants?
Is there a place in your mind for strangers?
Or are you uneasy with them and governed by fear?
So often lately there is a time in human lifetimes
When danger seems menacingly to threaten
It is happening now
All around you you see the warning signals
Generated by the false versions of reality
Cultivated by Herculean truth stealers
For whom adversaries mean status and power
And profitable weapons to manufacture
Awareness of this folly however is so important
Vital indeed for the survival of the human race
Gather around then you victims of engineered distrust
You fodder for corporate missionaries of hate
Turn away from derived animosity
Reject the fables of menace
Spurn the orchestrated lies
Perpetrated by the contaminated media
Controlled by leaders with omnipotent single mindedness
Turn your thoughts to positive hope
To a future devoid of manufactured antipathy
Free of unfounded hatred
And survive with love in your heart

On An Unnamed War

So
You are fighting terrorists to the death
Ending their existence
Waging a war that will not end until victory comes
But are children terrorists?
You are killing them in their thousands
Do you find terrorists among the disabled elderly?
You are killing them in their thousands
Are mothers terrorists?
You are killing them in their thousands
Are doctors and journalists terrorists?
Many many of them are dying by your hand
Homes are blasted out of existence by your bombs
Rubble litters endless streets with no name
For the sake of humanity stop now
Evil comes to him who evil does
Your slate is not clean but blighted
Nowhere in the battle you wage can justice be sighted
Guilty deeds you constantly perform
History will tell your story
It will flow through the halls of infamy
Like an icy wind
The moving finger of time
Will write your name on the walls
Of houses of ill repute
Absolution will be a flimsy dream in your sleep
And never a reality
For that is the way of war
It is always a symptom and never a solution
Forever a nightmare never a serenity
So march on soldiers of shame
On your route to eternal damnation
There you will be welcomed by the angels of death
Who will sing you the dirge you deserve
Amidst the wreckage of other people’s yearning
The time for change is here
So get to it now
And find your own salvation in peace

We Will Not Be Silent

The warnings are out
The doers of dark deeds hold the floor
Stand tall with their stentorian voices echoing everywhere
Hold your tongues you little people they proclaim
You insignificant pawns in the chess game of life
You puny dwarfs in the realm of giants
Be voiceless and listen
Learn the authorised version of truth from those in power
Absorb the sanctioned reality like obedient vassals
Negativity is not your privilege
Fault-finding will not be tolerated
You must obey and hold your tongue
As the saying goes
Verbal intrusion into subjects classified
Will incur public contempt, ridicule and penalty
Legal retribution to the highest level of the law
Punishment including the pain of solitary confinement
Contradictory beliefs will not be accepted
Endorsed and publicly ratified reality
Must, they repeat must, be celebrated in everything you do
So that is where we are now
That is the very nature of the choice we do not have
No disobedience, no critical words, no corrective dissent
Only compliance with the imposed accepted norm
No one must dare to speak to the contrary
Yet can there not be an error at some time in officialdom?
Is perfection a universal outcome always?
Is there not scope for wrong doing in every society?
Is misreckoning or misdeed not possible at some time?
And does felony triumph when good men do nothing?
Will our destiny be decided by what we do not do?
Well now, heed this you authoritarian behemoths
We have seen today things you have done
That clash with behaviour known as virtue
That harm people or vital institutions mercilessly
Causing poverty, injury or even death for innocents
Your deeds are causing pain in the world around us
So trust me: we will not be silent

A Last Hope

Aha!
Thus you wage your war
Your enemy is nothing but a category of hate
An entity without mortal needs
Just a target for you the righteous
A cancer needing heat therapy
A plague in the Eden you inhabit
Your bombs rain down on those foes
Branded by you as miscreants
And your supreme being is away on holidays
Pity is frowned upon
And discouraged with angry voices
Your plan is to drive that herd to other pastures
Leaving you to inhabit the promised land
Death is your convenient tool
Applied with the rigour of a master craftsman
It is a deadly plaything of the rich and powerful
A device of power put to use throughout time
And you use it now
Look at the chaos you impose
The wreckage of a society shattered without mercy
Bodies wrapped in white lying in the streets
People sobbing and mourning the lifeless
First responders hurrying into partly destroyed hospitals
With patients in their arms
Media cameras recording the chaos despite desperate danger
Where will this lead you?
Will you triumph in a cause célèbre?
No
Victory is but an empty token when the reason is injustice
Oppressors fostered by brutality are doomed to fail
You must not continue your way of bloodshed
Your cruel conviction you have the endless right to kill
Your demonic program of atrocity
Your inhumanity for which there is no valid reason
Hear this then O epitome of iniquity
Villain hidden by a mask of authenticity
Support is dwindling for you
Your associates are now seeing reason
So end your depravity in the name of human rights: now

royciebaby

Storm Guilty

The consequences are fearsome
Alarming, worrying, destructive
The corporate greed
Of those who really rule the world
Is the reason for the climate terror
The heat rises like the weather in Hades
Deadly change is the frightening outcome
Storms descend upon us with unnerving intensity
As financial gain gives rise to global warming
The consequences are savagely real
Death and destruction suddenly are the norm
All for the sake of pecuniary mission statements
Floods sweep away lives and vulnerable property
Hot days kill the unsuspecting elderly
Fire flares forth with savagery that outdoes hellfire
Houses burn, people die
And the lives of countless creatures end in flames
Warnings! Warnings! Warnings!
So often now the catch cry is watch and be ready
Unease rules the world for one dark reason
The rapacity of a powerful small sample of humanity
Their raison d’être is revealed for all to see
Money! Money! Money!
Oil and gas and coal, the Devil’s marbles,
Still befoul and poison the earth
Assembly lines of carbon-infected cars
Add nitrous oxide too
To roast our world
And so the sinister strategy continues to enrich the few
But a change is coming
You can hear new sounds in the air
The people’s voices
Echoing in alleyways where the temperature is too hot to bear
The message rings out through the hot nights
They who cause havoc, few in number but infinitely violent,
Are now exposed
Change is in the torrid air
And the sagacity of science will at last be noticed
Amidst the ensuing silence of felonious cash registers

The Socialist

See how they labelled him:
Communist!
Bolshevist!
Fascist!
When all he sought to do was share the wealth
Simply expressing a wish that everyone should own
The means of production
Distribution
And exchange
That idea was anathema to the ruling forces of the land
That intrusion into the free market
Would be cataclysmic for private enterprise
Such a trespass into the mechanism of the economy
Would crucify freedom
And plunge the nation into anti-capitalist free fall
See how the media then snuffed that battle with delight
Headlines mourned the potential death of national liberty
Influential phone-in gurus warned against change
Praising with all their might the canonised corporate lobby
As agents of liberty
Freedom loving angels that must be protected
From revolutionary debauchery
Thus the bewildered herd was guided to the right
The votes came in
The winners demanded laissez-faire existence
And life as we know it was privatised…
So what then are the consequences
When you cast your mind over the resulting patterns of life?
Notice please the vast numbers of the not so rich
In your free enterprise domain
Observe the short term profit in lieu of long term planning
The sudden emergence of a very rich few
The cost of education rising
The willingness to put profit ahead of welfare
The affection for weaponry as a source of income
With a trend to embark on profitable war
The skill of a rich minority in avoiding income tax
And the infamy for any man who dares to read Karl Marx

Warmonger

Aha!
Now the secrets are out
Archival evidence just released
All is revealed
You conspired with the war racketeers
To invade that innocent country
Lies were the in thing for you
Concocted warnings of nonexistent danger
Fallacious data wielded like a sword
Fake weapons of crass deduction
That gave your deceit overt reality
And led the world astray
So many people died
In a war that should never have been
Death came not for soldiers alone
But for other gentle souls whose only dream was peace
A coalition of the unwilling
All dead
And victims of your sinister scheming
So hear this now
Your name is attached to infamy
Truth has a way with wrongdoing such as yours
It stands firm in spite of political gimmickry
Historians tend to discover it
Eventually…
As a consequence of this, note well your fate:
Your artifice
Your duplicity
Your chicanery
Will be revealed to future students of the past
With overwhelming authenticity
What you are
And have been throughout your political life
Will be evident in the historical discourse
The hall of fame where once you dwelt
Will become a mob museum
Your place there will be verified by the children of your victims
And their voices will end forever your fake renown

MUSGA

Vote for this mindless, lying, cheating neocon
And Make Uncle Sam Gloat Again
These are words I am hearing everywhere
I don’t know his full history
Perchance he is merely an apparition
But I’ve noticed him lately
This young whippersnapper
Plying his trade amidst the corruption of politics
His youth might be a problem
For he lacks the experience of more mature men
He is very rich however
Never pays his taxes
Has a tower in New York named after him
Owns majestic aircraft
When he loses he never admits defeat
Hates foreigners like poison, even good and needy people,
Tends to promote riot and discord for unjust causes
Welcomes global warming avidly
Favours the rich and ignores the poor
Scorns public healthcare
Regards those killed in warfare as losers
Has denied the value of scientific advisory bodies
And imprisoned many children in appalling conditions
That is the emerging picture of this man
Despite his moral failures he is popular
He sways crowds with great skill
Ever ready to express his own perfection
He claps himself constantly
And promotes platitudes as if they were hard truths
Despite his vices this man’s fame is rising
The polls predict electoral success
Although voices opposed to him are growing louder
Our destiny as always will depend on a wise majority
On that final voting day
The world needs this young man, Adolf Smith,
To fail
So for the good of mankind, let it be.

Whistleblowers

For Julian Assange and David McBride

Well!
Just look at that
They see a deadly deceitful immoral deed
Expose it
Speak up with courage
Knowing silence would be conspiracy
And are punished vigorously
Indeed threatened with a gaol term
So
All you honest people
The brave ones
The ones who will not stay silent
In the presence of wickedness
Who are motivated by conscience
Who are moved to act in the presence of wrong
Who dare to dream of the power of truth
Do not go public
Do not trespass in the domain of the establishment
Realpolitik must not be interfered with
Just left to itself as a duty thrust upon all citizens
Thus the highest court of the land
The epitome of justice
Depends upon compliance with rules that protect the guilty
“I have seen offence Your Honour, but I dare not reveal it.”
No No No
In a land where truth is dangerous
Where arrant folly hides behind regulations
Behind active and convenient directives
Behind a rigorously applied code of silence
The voice of criticism must ring out loud and clear
Resounding especially in the emptied halls of integrity
Echoing in streets where no one walks in peace
And where fair-mindedness melts away like plastic at a cremation
This is a last chance
A one and only final hope of fair play
In the troubled game of modern day existence
So speak on brave friends and thank you

royciebaby

Voiceless

O how dark is the silence
So cold and calculating
Primacy discredited
Beautiful people denied a voice
With callous acrimony
Invented reasons sway an argument
With cruel overtones
Of racial prejudice
False allusion
And voiceless emptiness
Questions arise
As to why time’s judgement is ignored
Discarded like offal in a graveyard
Tagged like cancer in the lungs of the living
The answers are such sad reality
They scream out at you
Harsh
Deafening
Distortions of truth
That ring around the sky
Like storm in an upper-class tea cup
To echo in chasms of unreality
And so the status quo remains
Early death
Poverty
Excess imprisonment
Educational failure
And mores destroyed by big business
Such imposed taciturnity
Is so debased
So ignoble
So black-hearted
That it will remain forever
A fetid sample
Of the white man’s justice

Unholy War

It is a crime
If civilians suffer
When bombs rain down from heaven
With deliberate intent to kill
When even children and the aged know no safety
As it rains hot metal
And they die in their thousands
In a deliberate, purposeful war
As torn apart houses
Create a fitting moonscape of demise
In a panorama of victimisation
There is no excuse for this
No valid reason
Yes
This is a consequence of the warmonger syndrome
The excuse of the trigger-happy hawk
Backed by his military industrial complex
To commit war crimes
That reenforce his political agenda
His nominated enemies have no integrity
Deserve
No compassion
No destiny other than dying
For that is the way revealed by his ugly public image
So all triumph to him who arranges this
But the killing haunts his victory
Death as his agenda
Is a triumph of ignominy
That will stain the pages of history
With the blood of innocents
As the dirges ring out
Amidst the immeasurable despair of injustice

Yesterday’s Man

O I am yesterday’s man
Because I remember things…
When the air was fresh and not murky
When tempests were rare
When friendly gentle breezes cooled the days
When wildfire was an infrequent danger
When all the rivers ran
When the water in the lake was clean
When droughts were unusual
When floods were infrequent
When koalas all had a place to live
When bees did their work untainted
When glaciers were not melting
When ice at the poles was not vanishing
When species flourished and survived
When sea levels were not rising
When insect pests did not invade the earth
When farms flourished according to plan
When ecosystems knew no damage
When the globe was not warm
When heat stroke was uncommon

And when an industrial corporation
Did not shape the weather

Submarines

Eisenhower got it right*
We must beware of military power
Once weapons were not a market enterprise
Now they are and the racket is war**
So we need enemies
Foes are profitable
If you haven’t got them, you can invent them
Concocted fear makes the turnstiles tingle
And the stockpile of weaponry grows
As the warlike investors harvest the returns…
Which brings us to submarines
Aha!
Now that is a lucrative machination
So costly its makers foretell the profits with delight
Nuclear powered too
But don’t worry about the eternal atomic waste
That like the huge cost
Is a matter for future generations
Our great great grandchildren
Poor souls
So many social unsolved problems still
Health, education, housing needs,
All vital. immediate, costly, ongoing
And ignored by this weapon from the corporate masters
So questions arise
Is it true to surmise
That a need for this machine exists
That’s it then
Is there a man so filled with dread
Who never to himself has said
“There is a foe under every bed
So dive, dive, dive in the red.”

*January 17 1961 President Eisenhower coined the expression “military industrial complex” and warned of its dangers.

**In 1935 Smedley Butler, a distinguished American general, said in a speech and in a book that war is a racket.

Recollections In Old Age

When you are old, time grows in importance
You’ve been there before so remember things
The past is like a book
When you open it you can never tell
What page it will be at
But you read on thoughtfully
In ways that you have learned
If you have been lucky, happiness will ensue
As you relive again a joy
Sometimes though a tear may come
If sadness has been your lot
That is a crucial point
Your viewpoint will be an outcome of what you have done
Kindness and love are magic
Strong catalysts
That when remembered lift your spirits
So take care if your life has been brief
If you are young and ingenuous
Find a friend or a troubled soul to help
As soon as possible
Be giving with kindness
When you discover someone in pain
Ready to lend your hand
To an acquaintance beset with troubles
Imagine yourself in a similar situation
Share the suffering
Inflict kindness any way you can
And it will follow
As surely as the human mind can predict
That you will have a memory
To lighten shadows
That come your way in your later years
This above all
Remember
There is no better way to find joy
Than to give it to someone else
That golden rule
Can change your life
Indeed
It can change the world

royciebaby

Unnamed Malefactor

Begone dull fool
And take your pretence with you
You
Who thrust yourself
Into the lives of other fools
Who vote for you
Like ants attracted to sugar
Get thee hence
Out of my life
And the existence of others
For you are an evil spirit
Derived from the dark side of things
Where lies flourish
And truth is hushed up
By entrepreneurs of greed
Yes, I hear you
Telling your fairy tales
By the score
Where deception is the paramour
That you worship
Passionately
As you build fake towers of elegance
With donations from Hades
Be silent now
Give my ears peace
Before more dullards take your advice
And our world breaks up
Into small particles of ignorance
What?
Are you still talking?
Still conniving?
Very well then
The voice of the law now
Is loudly ringing from nirvana
And it’s time for you to fall apart in gaol

Climate Lesions

Wildfire now
Floods
Forty days forty nights in one hour
Landslip
Sculpturing death in hillsides
Heat
Incinerating days
And killing the vulnerable
Drought
Shrivelling existence into dust
How dare you
Smirk and get on with your daily business
Oblivious to the climate lesions
On our highway to Hell!
Heed this now
You and your deadly industries of gain
Your destructive mission statements
Your political infamy of acceptance
Your potent orchestrated lies
Are headed for a fall
Not a gentle descent
Not a faltering moment of inconvenience
Not a takeover by allies
But a deadly plunge into non existence
A chaotic conclusion to your schemes
A shattering of your evil dreams
So be off with you
You must now yield to change
Cease your destruction
Cease refining
End your hold on the market place of doom
Do it now
Before nature casts a spell on you
And turns you
Into a forgotten neoplasm of despair

Refugee Outrage

Shame
It’s a disgrace
A blot on the escutcheon
So pity the refugees
In Australian detention
People smuggling
Evokes a far worse crime
Pitiless, relentless, remorseless, ruthless
Unending imprisonment
implemented by corporate enterprise
For tainted profit
Fie I say!
How else to express my contempt?
So a parliament of fools
Steeped in folly
Harnesses the bias of the bewildered flock
For a successful plebiscite
Passes a law
That promotes injustice
Can you hear the cries of the sufferers?
See the strain on their faces
As despair increases?
Breathes there a sensitive thinker
Who does not
Pity these poor victims?
O hear me please
All you seekers of refuge
Riven by such cruelty
That tears your spirits asunder
And labels you wrongly as guilty
To brand you with the heated irons of injustice
Please forgive me
For not fighting against your torture
Pardon my silence
And punish me as you will
As now I know
The horror of my compliance
The deadly outcome of my acquiescence
The endless guilt of those transgressors I keep in power

A Teacher Remembers

Much have I travelled in the realms of learning
Hours and days and years of striving
Have passed me by
In the struggle to know the difference between right and wrong
As a child I was naive
Wondering about things and constantly puzzled
The youth was bolder
Simplifying solutions with outrageous confidence
The man was sagacious
Confident with answers based on valid evidence
Now
The old man is world-weary
Dwelling with dismay on so many past mistakes
As those earlier days
Still linger furtively in the mind
Those other selves in their own way
Now talk to the old man
That child was lonely
And his father’s reading gave him Jim Hawkins* for company
It’s a memory
That youth was filled with boundless energy
And his school taught him to play cricket
It’s a memory
That man taught in schools
And his pupils sometimes changed their micro world
It’s a memory
The present is always coloured by the past
Crucial former times
Bring memories of each stage of life’s performance
Merging into a final entity that is an ending
A last cloze test
Yes, you are a consequence of everything you have done
Such a vital medley it can be
A lifelong potpourri of outcomes
As the old man of this poem, I can now tell you
The one factor transcending all others
Above every recollection is what he did as a teacher

*The central character in Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island.

Unexpected Voice

I heard a voice the other night
I don’t know where it came from
Perhaps it was a dream
As it echoed through the darkness
I listened
As I am wont to do
Partly because I am unsure of many things
The words I heard were clear
Sonorous
And struck cords of awareness in my mind
They spoke of whiteness
The nature of my skin
And told me souls have no colour
Neither black nor white
The next focus of those words was time
The ultimate source of judgement for mankind it said
And a potent test of our ability to last
Thus it follows
That the only valid test of society’s worth
Is its history
A pox on your annals the voice continued
How dare you see as of consequence
Your mere few thousand years of social growth
Shame on you
When you crush, mutilate and harm indigenous people
Whose mores have been fashioned over aeons
This is a wrong that echoes in the halls of justice…
Then came silence
That quiet was a very potent thing
My mind wandered through diverse fields
Pausing here, stirring there, reflecting on what I had heard
Wondering, wondering, wondering
If I say and do nothing now am I a culprit?
Will passivity betray morality?
Do we need a black armband for a true history?
The yes response to those questions
Is the reason this humble poem exists

Submerged

On a recent maritime deal

Madhouse
Bedlam on wheels
Unmatched stupidity in the annals of folly
Look at you
You dancers at a festival of fools
To the sound of devilish music
Reckless adventurers overboard
Artisans of stupidity
Plunging our world into hock
By false accreditation
Impulsive journeymen of destruction
Swinging from the rafters of a condemned house
Misguided robots advocating nonsense
Selling our tomorrows to vultures of profit
Idiots wearing masks of pretence
Foretelling war by pulling triggers
And preaching of peace with venom
Counterfeit pundits dissembling for the gain of others
You aces dealt from a tainted pack
Condemning your fellows to an endless wrack
You are
Our last hopes fading forever
Of a peaceful and loving world
So get you gone
All of you
To the place where jingoists belong
And take those submarines with you

Corporate Monarchy

So the mouse that roared is gone
Fading away into euphemistic retreat
Leaving our destiny in the hands of the Prince of Wails
The heir presumptive
So it goes hence
That icon derived from fools’ gold
How shall we bid it farewell?
Heads bowed and walking backwards?
Swearing an oath of allegiance?
Saluting its flag of ruthless self interest?
No no!
This time we will spread the word
For that sovereignty now has ended
A time of tyranny is over
Gone like a cancer removed by a surgeon’s knife
And what remains?
The question is relevant
So let me tell you
A power-crazed instrument of control still lingers
With its aftershock of consequence
Yet time, the absolute power,
Has caught up with it and disenchanted it
As a deed to end a corporate monarchy
It is now seen as grist for a mill of infamy
And, as we look carefully at the edifice left behind,
We see still
Deceit masquerading as truth
Duplicity as integrity
Mendacity as veracity
Degradation as privation
Do you see what I mean?
The word is out
The truth is known
So its followers henceforth
Will be swallowers of the curative known as exposure

All Things are Fine

I am the child reviled
I am the foreigner you disdain
I am the old man defiled who sleeps out in the rain
I am the teenage user
I am the homeless waif
I am the wife abuser from whom she will never be safe
I am the alimony shirker
I am the young alcoholic
I am the retrenched worker diagnosed as melancholic
I am the illiterate student
I am the bankrupt receiver
I am the priest who seems prudent but is in fact a deceiver
I am the costly lawyer
I am the persecuted Jain
I am the hostile employer obsessed with personal gain
I am the voice declared sinister
I am the last in the line
I am still the prime minister and yes, all things are fine

royciebaby

Unnamed Malefactor

Begone dull fool
And take your pretence with you
You
Who thrust yourself
Into the lives of other fools
Who vote for you
Like ants attracted to sugar
Get thee hence
Out of my life
And the existence of others
For you are an evil spirit
Derived from the dark side of things
Where lies flourish
And truth is hushed up
By entrepreneurs of greed
Yes,I hear you
Telling your fairy tales
By the score
Where deception is the paramour
That you worship
Passionately
As you build fake towers of elegance
With donations from Hades
Be silent now
Give my ears peace
Before more dullards take your advice
And our world breaks up
Into small particles of ignorance
What?
Are you still talking?
Still conniving?
Very well then
The voice of the law now
Is loudly ringing from nirvana
And it’s time for you to fall apart in gaol

Climate Lesions

Wildfire now
Floods
Forty days forty nights in one hour
Landslip
Sculpturing death in hillsides
Heat
Incinerating days
And killing the vulnerable
Drought
Shrivelling existence into dust
How dare you
Smirk and get on with your daily business
Oblivious to the climate lesions
On our highway to Hell!
Heed this now
You and your deadly industries of gain
Your destructive mission statements
Your political infamy of acceptance
Your potent orchestrated lies
Are headed for a fall
Not a gentle descent
Not a faltering moment of inconvenience
Not a takeover by allies
But a deadly plunge into non existence
A chaotic conclusion to your schemes
A shattering of your evil dreams
So be off with you
You must now yield to change
Cease your destruction
Cease refining
End your hold on the market place of doom
Do it now
Before nature casts a spell on you
And turns you
Into a forgotten neoplasm of despair

Refugee Outrage

Shame
It’s a disgrace
A blot on the escutcheon
So pity the refugees
In Australian detention
People smuggling
Evokes a far worse crime
Pitiless, relentless, remorseless, ruthless
Unending imprisonment
Carried out by corporate enterprise
For tainted profit
Fie I say!
How else to express my contempt?
So a parliament of fools
Steeped in folly
Harnesses the racism of the bewildered flock
For a successful plebiscite
Passes a law
That promotes injustice
Can you hear the cries of the sufferers?
See the strain on their faces
As despair increases?
Breathes there a sensitive thinker
Who does not
Pity these poor victims?
O hear me please
All you seekers of refuge
Riven by such cruelty
That tears your spirits asunder
And labels you wrongly as guilty
To brand you with the heated irons of hate
Please forgive me
For not fighting against your torture
Pardon my silence
And punish me as you will
As now I know
The horror of my compliance
The deadly outcome of my acquiescence
The endless guilt of those transgressors I keep in power

Peace Of Mind

Much have I travelled in the realms of learning
Hours and days and years of striving
Have passed me by
In the struggle to know the difference between right and wrong
The child was naive
Wondering about things and constantly puzzled
The youth was bolder
Simplifying solutions with outrageous confidence
The man was sagacious
Confident with answers based on valid evidence
The old man is world-weary
Dwelling with dismay on so many past mistakes
Ah those earlier days
Still linger furtively in my mind
Those other selves in their own way
Talk to me now
That child was lonely
And his father’s reading gave him Jim Hawkins for company
Now I remember
That youth was filled with boundless energy
And his school taught him to play cricket
Now I remember
That man was a teacher
And his pupils often changed their micro world
Now I remember
An old man recalls so much
And his life in the present is coloured by his past
An outcome of former times
As memories of each stage of life’s performance
Merge into a final entity that is an ending
Yes, a final cloze test
You are a consequence of all that you have been
Such a vital medley it is, both good and bad
A potpourri of outcomes
But my best hope of peace of mind
Above all else is what I gave rise to as a teacher

Voice

I heard a voice the other night
I don’t know where it came from
Perhaps it was a dream
As it echoed through the darkness
I listened
As I am wont to do
Partly because I am unsure of many things
The words I heard were clear
Sonorous
And struck cords of awareness in my mind
They spoke of whiteness
The nature of my skin
And told me souls have no colour
Neither black nor white
The next focus of those words was time
The ultimate source of judgement for mankind it said
And a potent test of our ability to last
Thus it follows
That the only valid test of society’s worth
Is its history
A pox on your annals the voice continued
How dare you see as of consequence
Your mere few thousand years of social growth
Shame on you
When you crush, mutilate and harm indigenous people
Whose mores gave been fashioned over aeons
This is a wrong that echoes in the halls of justice…
Then came silence
That quiet was a very potent thing
My mind wandered through diverse fields
Pausing here, stirring there, reflecting on what I had heard
Wondering, wondering, wondering
If I say and do nothing now am I a culprit?
Will passivity betray morality?
Do we need a black armband for a true history?
The answers to those questions
Are the reasons this humble poem exists

royciebaby

A Love Affair

Once I fell in love
It was a strange feeling
Unknown before
Changed me so much it’s hard to explain
I was suddenly strong
Undaunted by the world’s previous hostility
I noticed beautiful things
Once unseen
By an embryo in adult clothing
Even the sun seemed friendly on a hot day
Rain was fun
As you shared an umbrella
The moon was a lovers’ lantern
Shining on two
Whispers were poems of excitement
Laughter was music
That you danced to majestically
Spoken words were magic
That filled you with wonder
And time was endless
When you’re involved it with another
All this was a consequence of togetherness
Of a life suddenly shared
Now that joy has ended
And time is a dark adversary
Days pass untouched by the previous enchantment
Death tends to be so final
Yet
Somehow, somewhere
Memory rises triumphant in the loneliness
And some things you still remember
For true love
The kind that wreaks change in the world
Lives by its own energy
Forever

Always

Something happens
When love comes your way
A far from trivial thing
You are suddenly not alone
In a world where hostility rules each day
Things are different in other ways
You have a listener
Who pays attention to you
Your ideas will be valued
However wild they may be
If you laugh
There will be an echo
As another person responds
To the laughter
If you sigh
With a tear in your eye
Sympathy will surround you
Like a warm blanket in winter
If you dance
A partner will be there
Moving with your time to the music
If you scheme
An ally will come forward
With willingness to conspire
If you dream
The reverie will be caught by another
Who runs with it
To the highest mountains of the mind
And if you die
The world will have changed
Be just a little different
Always

Greed

A destructive way of living
That denies help for the needy
Is greed
It is a fungal infection of the mind
Whenever it prevails
That leaves society impervious to pity
You will notice it
Shockingly
When power brings vast rewards to the unworthy
In a world that is a marketplace…
Graspingness
Is a common social blight in such a world
Observable for example
In mercenary, usurious, predatory, influential entities
Known as banks
Yes
That is where reform
Is so desperately needed
Have you noticed bankers’ sordid triumphs lately?
Seen the unjust pricing of their services?
Felt the pain a tawdry corporate monopoly
Imposes on its clients?
That is the way of things when the money business
Predominates:
The rich get returns while the poor crowd burns
So
Let us go then, you and I,
To where interest rates do not decide your fate:
Where you live
Where you work
Where you learn
Where you dream
Where you die
Ah me!
Once in my lifetime I owned a bank
It was devised by a government I could vote for or decry
But privatised by dullards it now causes me to sigh

Dear Friend

For John Bradshaw

Dear friend
We have noticed
Your final hour has come
And you are pretending to leave us
You thought you could do that
Just fade away
Into the vast plains of forgetfulness
Come on now
You, a much loved teacher
And distinguished sportsman
Should know better than that
Why
You will be with us
Constantly
As the years pass
When summer turns into winter and football begins
When naive students need wisdom to guide them
When children play games amidst laughter
When friends share examples of your tender-heartedness
Or when Auld Lang Syne is eloquently sung
Therefore
Heed this now
With no more of your diversions
You cannot slip away from us
But will be with us constantly
As the world demands we value you correctly
As a consequence
Get this into your head
Note that these words are not idle gossip
Or unsubstantiated assertions
By ingenuous busybodies
They are the truth
As verified by a host of your comrades
So end the mythology
And admit that you will walk beside us from now
Until the end of time

So Beautiful

You were so beautiful
Artless
Not the film star type based on illusion
Or the highly paid fashion model
With beauty
Removable with its mascara and lipstick
Just a special persona
Salient, unique, inspiring
In an unpretentious way
With a light in your eyes that swept me away
When first I saw your face
I changed forever
And when you noticed me
I wondrously learnt to rule the world
It was a spectacular change
I began to respect myself
Suddenly felt I could do things as never before
Academe
Had previously been an impassable barrier
Now it welcomed my contest
And I won
I walked taller, ran faster
And breathed deeply more easily
Ascending mountains with an alacrity
Previously undreamed of
Yes, I was the new man you made me
And I loved you fondly
More fondly than this humble poem can tell
Then fell the shadow
A change that tore the world asunder
And seemed to turn reality into a dream
Of distress
For you had found another
And you left me with nothing but these memories
All that remains of us
Yet somehow even now they lessen my despair

royciebaby

Political Gimmickry

Have you noticed
How words flow from a politician’s tongue
Like melting ice cream:
An endless stream of non sequiturs
Disguised
As meaningful discourse
Sprinkled with emotional clichés such as
Freedom
Our way of life
True friends
The nation will triumph
Time immemorial
Or history will make it so?
That is the way they do things these days
Politically
These loquacious figurines
Carefully avoiding
Verbal evidence of their misdemeanours
As they babble on
In the Hanging Gardens of democracy
Not that this is something new
It has been the practice down the ages
It’s not newspeak* but oldspeak
Benedict Arnold’s are everywhere today
Though focus groups may conceal it
Elections are confidence tricks
Success is not an outcome of truth
But rather
A consequence of spoken mythology
Sprinkled with fear
Or greed
Or lies about a fictitiously perfect world
I am sorry
Yes indeed sorry
But I simply cannot imagine any circumstance
When I would be a votary of these out of control fabulists

*A term from George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-four

Sport

So the crowds roll in
Wearing the apparel of disciples
Ready to praise their heroes
Or condemn vociferously their foes
While the visual media play around with imagery
Generating spectacular folklore
With images of violent heroism
To keep the cash registers ticking over
Cheering and jeering follow
According to events on the playing field
As awareness of the real world is diverted
Poverty, illness, climate are not the focus here
Not the issues of true significance
All that matters is who wins
And the formulae of media publicity triumph…
A word with you on spectators
Why does that vociferous critic get your attention?
Why do you respond to his jeers
And give him significance?
You the performer are all that matters
He is nothing but a blow-fly infecting meat
While you are an actor on the only significant stage
So let him be
Heed not his condemnation of the deeds you do
Give him no attention
For his ego is no concern of yours
You are not outside the fence
Where loud-mouthed failures vociferate
But in the arena
Bravely prepared to triumph or fail
If you win
The victory is yours alone
And if you fail
At least you will never be
One of those noisy souls who dare nothing
And know neither victory nor defeat

Advertisement Pain

Look at them
Intruding ruthlessly into our lives
Mangling our experience
For the sake of profit
They have approval to do this
From all the agencies that rule us
The open market is sacred ground for us
Free enterprise must not be hindered
So advertisements have free reign as worthy causes
Permitted to encroach, impinge, trespass
And shatter artistic experience
Or tear down the drama of sporting achievement
As the money stream flows relentlessly on…
Do they tell the truth
These panaceas of profit?
Or are they simply lies dressed up as integrity?
One common man recently implied
That a worthy product advertises itself
While only the faulty need lies of support
Ah me
If only a glimmer of truth lies in these words
So much of our time will be wasted
And as I am old and running out of spare moments
To ease the pain
I have resolved henceforth
Should I find myself ad addicted
In my remaining days
I will sigh deeply
Switch off the incarcerated medium
And enjoy the gentle, dignified uncontaminated peace

Tears

Suffer the little children to come unto me…
Mark 10: 13-16
Desperate child of loneliness
Withering in an emptiness of care,
O how your cries pass me by as
I wend my way
Down crowded mercenary streets
There you are but a decimal dot
On a balance sheet of adult business.
How the droplets of your endless ennui
Fall into my eyes
Like no pain bargains from a chemist’s supermarket.
And the mourning sounds of your despair
Tinker with my eardrums
Like raindrops in a desert
Dissolving into mists
Of non existence,
While the rays of pain from your eyes
Bounce off my thick skin
Like festivals of sunbeams
Found down on Bondi Beach.
So there you are
Little thing,
Tiny piece of humanity
Savaged by the biting, cruel daggers
Of grown up indifference
That tears you apart

Until all that at last remains
Are the echoes of your tiny voice in the wind
And your tears falling as rain
Again, again, again . . .
O what have they done to that rain?

Guilty Stranger

So
You proclaim your innocence
Even though your case is weak
Express anger
Towards those who undermine your reputation
Even though circumstances define your guilt
Yes
You are guilty
Culpable, blameworthy, answerable
For what you have done
And what you are
A deceiver
Arrogant and self-praising
For whom the truth is not sacred
But malleable
Your words
Echoing in the halls of infamy
Ring around my brain
Like death knells
Mourning the demise of reality
Bland self-praise is your calling card
Your fake virtue
Sprinkled on our awareness
Like acid rain
Turning our thoughts
Into misadventures of the mind
That will haunt us down the years
Be off with you then
Far from the lives you contaminate
Begone
And put an end
To the sorry saga of your misdeeds
Before I discover who you are

royciebaby