Since the crisis of 2008 employers are expecting their staff to do more work for less money. Trans National Corporations pay pitifully little tax and contribute even less to the common good. Such a situation is not sustainable.
This poem was forming in my head before I read the latest shameful statics.
SHAVING TIME
Today,
as every other,
it's
the 6:30 am hurtle,
50
in the 30 zone.
Zero
contracted,
a
quart of tasks pours
into
his pintpot of hours
He
juggles rent and food,
fuel
and debit,
hand
to mouth.
There
is no trickle down,
there
is no end,
it
will get worse.
But bleaker still is an article in Science that reports a study into the 94 ecological processes that are the basis of healthy marine, freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems. Unfortunately 80% are already showing signs of distress and response to climate change. You can read about it for yourself here.
We appear incapable of treating members of our own species fairly let alone of curtailing our destructive behaviours. There will be a price to pay for our actions.
he swapped his wife for the radio
by
acrimony not by choice
and
here he is in the night
twisting
in memory soaked sheets
balancing
recrimination
against
sleep
the
pressure of the night
compress
the voice on the World Service
dream
switch
to
a grandstand view
of
his hopes falling at the first hurdle
then
dead horse heavy
he
is trapped beneath
it
will take years to get free
I have revised this poem. You can read the first draft here. Discussing it with the Secret Poets led me led me to expand the middle stanza. Hopefully this makes it clearer.
Bob Marley came to mind as I wrote this post. The lines: think your in heaven, when your living in hell seem to me to sum up the perspective of those with the power.
Peace, love and unity. Until the next time.
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