Royce Levi Australian Teacher and Author

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

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

Heaven

When I am dead
Where will you find me?
Look for me
In a rainbow after a storm
In a morning mist
In a bird’s wings as it masters the air
In the petals of a flower in an old man’s garden
In a sunrise over a silent sea
In a moonbeam filtering through tall trees
In the first star after sunset
In a butterfly dancing nonchalantly on air
In a crystal clear mountain stream
In a mushroom springing to life after rain
In wild flowers adorning the workaday bush
In your slippers when you’re in from the cold
In the silence just before you fall asleep
And in a page of one of my books
However tattered it may be

The Spirit Of The Game

Stumped 2023

Listen to the booing
Bad conduct ensuing
From vociferous fools
Who ignore the rules
Fake heroes they are outside the fence
Where they loudly create false recompense
That batsman is out
There can be no doubt
Note well the umpire’s act
For he is the sole judge of fact
How can the doer of a legal feat
Be branded by a mob as an arrant cheat?
Hearken to the noise – it’s mindless babble
The kind you hear from a witless rabble
They declare that an honest man’s a fraud
And demean the contest with noisy discord
Anger is hurled into peaceful air
And you won’t find a sportsman anywhere
Such wrongful behaviour puts an end to decorum
Justice decrees that we simply ignore ’em
Play up play up and play the game
Change your act or endure the shame
For history will surely judge your ways
As the kind of music that a hooligan plays
So be silent now and restore the peace
Or you’ll stay forever outside your crease

Yer Money Or Yer Life

Smoking kills
Call the Quitline
137 484 or 13QUIT
Coles sign

There, that’s it then
I’ve just bought my Marlboros from Coles
Good value too
Special discount price
Although could have bought two meals from KFC with that
Yes I want to quit
Eventually
But I can’t just now
I’m a nervous type
And smoking calms me down
I’m only young too
Too young to die
And old age
The usual time for fatal illness Is so far, far away
Won’t call Quitline either
I’m not a wimp
Or a child
Running to Mummy or Daddy for help
So that’s it then
Thou shalt not kill
Unless there’s money in it
Profit for the chosen few
And for the government
So I smoke, smoke, smoke my days away
And tell the Usher at the Golden Gate
That he’ll just have to wait
As I’m not quite ready yet
To light my last and fatal cigarette

Weapons Of Peace

What is an alliance in today’s world?
It is a mission statement
For the military industrial complex
Just look at those well dressed figures
Holding hands in an extended handshake
Posing for the cameras
Smiling with fake courtship
As a warning to non-aligned nations
Behave yourselves
Or you will incur our wrath
And be doomed by our powerful togetherness
So the war game continues
Defined by cooperative tainted media
That give reality
The veracity of children’s fairy tales
Weapons of peace
That’s what they are
Those statements from the conference
Mere words
That define acceptable international relations
And set the wheels of war industries turning
As deterrents creating not sticks and stones
But powerful, frightening devices
The latest gimmickry of fear and Death
Rockets that you cannot hide from
Cluster bombs designed specifically to kill personnel
Submarines powered by atomic activity
And aircraft with infinite power to kill
Warnings these
Messages sent forth
Concerning an overt manifest destiny
Allegedly to protect a way of life
That is the epitome of virtue
Thus the conflict is defined
Morality versus evil
And the good shall inherit the earth
Provided they are armed well enough to do it

Time To Smell The Roses

I went for a walk this morning
It was hard work
As I’ll soon be ninety
And my knees are like America
They’ve seen better days
Yes that short stroll was not easy
My walking stick gave me a hint of security
Yet I remained quite afraid of falling
Nevertheless I had sallied forth
The sun was comforting on my neck
The air was inspiringly fresh
And to my surprise I had company
A big black bird had come in from the reserve
We both paused and eyed each other
Then as I decided I had done enough walking
And turned to return indoors
The bird assumed I was after its scalp
It turned and kept a safe distance from me
Walking in the same direction
It was so graceful
And I was like a broken down cart horse
Shoeless and treading on hot coals
In this way we progressed for quite a distance
When I paused for breath
It too stood still
So elegant, so tall, yet so alert
I knew I was under close scrutiny
Yet something else was happening to me
I felt so attracted to that bird
Inspired by its majesty
By the charcoal blackness of its feathers
The gentle flexibility of its neck
And the luminosity of the eyes that were watching me
I moved again and our rapport suddenly ended
Those great wings stretched outwards
And away it flew
Something happened to me on the rest of that journey
My step was just a little firmer
And I paused to smell some roses
Before I went inside

royciebaby

Vote For Me

Now I declare
You have the chance
To get me into power
So listen well
Here is my stance
My plan at this witching hour
I’m dedicated
And very well able
To make our country great
So hurry now
And vote for the fable
Ere rivals shut the gate
Now I am one
Of this world’s attackers
And I will fulfil your dreams
I get things done
With the help of my backers
Whatever their devious schemes
Deceit won’t matter
It avoids the mess
Of government behind the times
When you make the laws
There is no duress
And you get away with the crimes
It is easy for you
To assess my might
I rival the god Osiris*
Nothing will stop me
From getting things right
I’ll even ignore the virus
I will sweep aside
The opposing crew
And drive them to the slaughter
Even though it’s true
When it comes to IQ
I am but a fish out of water
But that doesn’t matter
I am your man
As long as we’ve got the numbers
I’ll get things done
With a brilliant plan
That no truth encumbers
Yes guile is the way
That now I choose
Convinced I’ll avoid detection
It’s the framework of fraud
I’ll astutely use
To triumph at the next election

*Osiris was the supreme Ancient Egyptian god.

Fire

So it’s your compliance
Denying the science
The evidence is there
Of the world’s despair
But money in your pocket is all that matters
Despite people dying and lives in tatters
It’s a massacre of burning
Calamity returning
Over and over again
And the people need to know when
Your shifty mind will master
The truth of the disaster
Just look at those flames clutching the sky
A tragic reason so many die
So don’t deny the deadly white-knuckle cause
Listen to the thunder as the wildfire roars
Yet you still keep your bargain with the Devil
And allow deadly carbon at a lethal level
You pay no heed to calamities of coal
You fund the mines in a sinister role
There is no justice in your behaviour
Global warmers see you as their saviour
So as the flames sound their death knell
Shake hands with Vulcan *– you know him well

*Vulcan was the Roman god of fire.

Climate Skeptic

Don’t know why
There’s no sun up in the sky
“Stormy Weather” Lena Horne Song 1956

Australia’s NDC outlines an economy wide emissions reduction
target of 26-28% below 2005 levels by 2030. Parliament of Australia

How many roads must that doubter travel down
Before he learns to be wise?
How many years can a man be a clown
Ere he stops polluting the skies?
The answer my friend is blowing in the breeze
And climate denial’s a disease
Just look at wildfire to quell your desire
To let the world stay the same
Will the planet transpire wrapped in the pyre
Or are you moved by the shame?
And what of the drought how can you leave out
Economic ruin of a nation?
Where is the wise voice talking about
The truth of this deadly privation?
And then there is flood with its torrent of mud
Destroying the beauty of life
Is the story of living to be written in blood
With the norm for existence strife?
Questions such as these can influence fate
As so much rests on reply
Suggestions you give must change the debate
Or we kiss our planet goodbye
Just one more thought might come to your mind
Before you answer each query
Time’s running out for our people to find
Respect for scientific theory
Yes the lesson is stark so recall Noah’s ark
Before we sink in the gloom
See the voice of reason as a light in the dark
Or would you prefer a tomb?

Photo Opportunity

I note how you grasp each photo opportunity
As newsmen follow you around
You are an everywhere man
Posing as a hero who never lacks a fan
Shaking hands or watching a game
Wearing a hard hat or lighting a flame
Cheering up old folks or chatting with a child
Walking with dignitaries driving crowds wild
Posing as a key man thrice blessed with friends
Acting as a film star whose fame never ends
So it is with political intrigue
You make the world your own blitzkrieg
And what is the purpose of your singularity?
Why to focus on polls and enhance popularity
Yes that is why you do it
There’s no other way to construe it

Your basic inception is pure deception
As you show your devious persona
You cunningly court the desired reception
That denies you are a loner
So there we have it your sinister habit
That reveals exactly what you are
You take every chance and blandly grab it
Visibility near and far
But your future is still prone to blunders
You are as ephemeral as dreams
For what you are screams and thunders
To expose your deadly schemes
But beware of the thought that success can be bought
In a dubious monetary direction
Havoc in the end just can’t be wrought
Except at a lawful election

There reality can all deception rend
As truth and nothing but truth will win in the end

Enforced Nonentity

Here I am
My life still aflame
Still ready to take up arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them*
Many thoughts for future action flood my mind
Ways to improve the world
As well as myself
Such a glorious opportunity
To make the most of life
And sprinkle water on the deserts of ignorance
My demise is not yet in my thoughts
Between now and then I have much to do
Learn this learn that
Read this read that
Write this write that
Countless ways to squeeze the juice out of time
To make each day count
As a little triumph beyond mere necessity
So why do you threaten me with the enforced nonentity
Of aged care
To turn me into a dependent anachronism
Hand fed by strangers
As if I were unable to help myself?
I may be a dependant some time but not today
If you try to impose such existence upon me,
I warn you
I will flee your sight and dance on the moon

*With thanks to Hamlet Act 3 Scene 1

Afterwords

Well now here I am – somewhere
What am I doing here?
According to many I’m in my senility
Using the surplus time of my life
To fill pages with my lack of ability
That’s true enough I suppose
No work – little play
A recipe for a dull old man
And yet maybe
There are some extenuating circumstances
(Big words I learnt decades ago)
Maybe, just maybe
Someone will read those words of mine
And get an idea for me or against me
As a consequence
The world will be just a little different

royciebaby