Echoes

Socialism or Barbarism! Which?

Citizens, of what once was the Third Reich,

Voting in numbers for the barbaric;

Can they be persuaded, one day, to switch

From all parties left and right and centre?

They’ve fundamental grievances of course,

Yet bitter politics lead to remorse

Once nationalism’s allowed to enter

Everyday discourse. Politicians try,

But their best intentions fail hour by hour

Because capital holds the real power:

And patriotism is its biggest lie.

The ballot box can leave pundits aghast,

When it’s an echo chamber for the past.

D.A.

Making Waves

Take a body of water, a Great Lake

And draw a line, calling it a border.

Then let a president give the order

That he has a pressing claim to stake,

Being the Commander in Chief of the rain,

And which way the wind blows depends on him,

With the whole world subject to his whim,

No reason required, no need to explain.

Never mind those who have lived and still live

Lakeside and beyond, or generations

Yet to be who’ll transcend contending nations

And the imperial imperative.

Water laps at the shore ever the same,

Utterly indifferent to a name.

D. A.

Do not question, they want you to Obey,

Just be quiet, acquiesce to the state of Play.

Keep Marching to the tune of Capitalism’s Might:

Left Right! Left Right! both wings claim to be Right.

If you look no further than your own garden Gate,

The divide and conquer agenda facilitates the Hate;

This dog-eat-dog rat race is long past it’s sell by Date.

Whether it’s Labour, Liberal, Green, Reform or Tory,

It will still end up the same old worn out Story.

To survive this system needs to Dehumanise;

We need to Agitate! Educate! And Organise!

The man made nation state keeps us on a Plate,

But why sell our labour even for the highest Rate?

We can replace this system based on Greed,

With a just society based on human Need.

Harley Wears

Mr. Presidents…

Mr. Presidents in Washington and

Moscow, presiding on a mystery:

What’s made them myopic to history?

Have they seen some virtue in what they’ve planned,

Ignoring examples of Stalingrad,

Of bombing Hanoi back to the stone age?

The blitzing of London provoked cold rage,

But no surrender, no matter how bad.

Missiles and drones don’t defeat, they incense.

Kiev and Tehran shaken, yet do not fall,

While the shattered dead lie beneath it all,

Civvy Street victims of absence of sense.

Mr. Presidents, brother to brother,

Look in the mirror and see the other.

D.A.

Culpa

Firstly Venezuela shaken,

Many thousands dead and injured,

More homeless, living with the dread

And the sorrow for those taken.

Columbia had felt the shock,

The persistence of danger shown

By a sudden quake of its own.

The earth trembles and buildings rock

And fall. A tumble of concrete

And shattered glass on those who die.

A question: Where does the fault lie?

Between plates, the one that’s discrete?

The most deadly fault seems to be

That which’s running through poverty.

D. A.

Punch and Judy Man

The tide ebbs and flows in Clacton,

Waves advance, pause and then retreat,

Quite unmoved by human conceit

Enjoying the fresh air and fun.

It’s not beyond Westminster’s reach

The squabbling for office and place,

Where everyone’s more than one face.

There’s to be drama on the beach,

A show that’s seemingly funny

And yet is actually grotesque,

The character behind the mask

Only performs for the money.

Once you given all you can spare

You’ll find he is not really there.

D. A.

Penalties

Both captains of England beaming

Out through a betting shop window.

The trophy they hold’s just for show

To entice punters who’re dreaming

World Cup dreams. Footballing success

Against the odds: There is romance

And an outside gamble that chance

Might pay out, and so help to address

The piker’s parlous fiscal state.

Also, there’s national pride at stake,

All lost on a simple mistake;

Seeming perniciousness of fate.

Briefly, the optimism flows,

But then, the final whistle blows.

D. A.

Screenshots from Special Military Ops.

Blazing apartment block, then another

With the length of its east wall sliced away

Exposing bedrooms, beds just made today,

Lounges and kitchens exposed for weather

To make it worse. Child’s buckled tricycle,

One lone shoe, laces knotted in a bow,

From smouldering rubble pram handles show

No sign of humanity. A trickle

Of water from a fractured pipe, shopping

Trolley and a tail fin and an upturned

Turtle of a car crazy glazed and burned,

Thick smoke and dust and masonry dropping.

Once such a site has been cleared, what remains?

Real estate, investment, capital gains.

D. A.

Democracy?

Voters in rotten and pocket boroughs

Were bought and sold for beer, grace and favours,

The squire owned both hustings and sabres

Of the yeomanry; no voting errors

Then, with open ballots. The inducements

These days appear as misinformation,

Encouraging inchoate vexation,

Over stimulated by bombastic rants

Intended to raise the hackles and play

On prejudices of the disengaged,

And so the farce is promoted and staged,

The grand theatrics of democracy.

Should grace and favour of the public will

Falter, the state retains its sabres still.

D. A.