Each Time We Pass (Reposted)

EACH TIME WE PASS

……………………………………………………………………………………………For Jean Giono

Each time we pass
In the corridor or on the street
Let us look at each other and laugh
Let us never be thinking of something else

Until one day in the midst of all the noise
And having pardoned one another for disturbing the silence
Let us begin to laugh
And wait for the idea to catch on

“We have to choose between two alternatives
Progress and peace”
As a beggar once said
And let us choose peace

Let us retrace our steps to the eighteenth century
And try again
Let us admit poverty and famine
Discipline ourselves in trust

Let us stop manufacturing
And make things again
Take the patience to make things
That last a thousand years

Let us close our schools
And begin to teach again
Let us learn to love life with passion
And to prefer death to life

Give back his function to Time
And leave all the destruction to him
Let us think in terms of centuries again
Leaving birth and death to control our population

Let us plant fields of flowers
Use our seeds to feed the birds
Bring deer down from the mountains
And light our skies by the stars

One day in the midst of all the noise
And having pardoned one another for disturbing the silence
Let us begin to laugh
And wait for the idea to catch on …

Merry-go-round

MERRY-GO-ROUND

Involve! Evolve! Revolve! Devolve!
Evolve! Revolve! Devolve! Involve!
Revolve! Devolve! Involve! Evolve!
Devolve! Involve! Evolve! Revolve!

‘Stop’ signs ‘Give Way’
No ‘But’s; only ‘And’s
For each one committed to social change
Another one is committed to an asylum

All God’s chillun
Got dancin’ feet
An’ so don’t you step on my
Lew Grade Blues
——————————————————————

 Notes on “Merry-go-round”:-

 ”Blue Suede Shoes” is a rock and roll standard written and first recorded by Carl Perkins in 1955 and is considered one of the first rockabilly (rock and roll) records and incorporated elements of blues, country and pop music of the time. The song was notably covered by Elvis Presley.  (Wikipedia)

If you do not know of Lew Grade, there is always Google.

Cost

pic
pic
There’s more than one way to skin a poem!

The Daily Grind

THE DAILY GRIND

morning well wicked early still
when alarm bell rings

unglue gummy eyes
peer through foetid gloom
grope around to kill it
sniff up last night’s stale breath
puke worthy – and you expected?

quick shower, squirt and spray
baited hooks set – and dreams
“I swear (s)he fancies me”
a hopeful phone trills – eyes gleam
and stick it in your ear – “hi”

now on your mark, get set
and go, raging or else uncomplaining
by crammed tube or heaving bus
or through poison-pumping gridlock
noxious hell whichever option

a compliant commuter – a clone – a costumed clown
stuck up the back end of a pantomime horse
blindly galloping into thunderous oblivion
holding your snotty nose to the grindstone
scrounging shekels to fuel your shakey schemes

yes, here’s the life you were schooled for
to be laid on the butcher’s chopping block
to hang ripe for the black reaper’s picking
next to our attempts to heal our broken hearts
keeping food on the table is their sharpest weapon

but pity the overseers in their turn
the restless scuttling tinker men
well heeled tepid heartless overlords
with their eternal fear of the rank and vile
whose oversensitivity is such a bore

do they lie in the dark wakeful
awaiting the day their own alarm bells ring?

Hope

HOPE

Though warnings sound throughout the land
And no one seems to understand
And though the end is close at hand
You and I will stand
My brother
You and I will stand

Though they send their planes to sow the land
With seeds of the destruction they have planned
And the rumours of war are on every hand
You and I will stand
My sister
You and I will stand

…..BRIDGE
…..Yesterday´s joy soon turns to sorrow
…..What´s right today may be wrong tomorrow
…..But when we’ve fought our fights
…..And had our fun
…..We shall all be judged by the things we’ve done
…..When we’ve fought our fights
…..And had our fun
…..We shall all be judged by the things we’ve done

And one day soon their fortress grand
Will crumble back into the sand
And we shall sing throughout the land
You and I will stand
My brother
You and I will stand

You and I will stand
My sister
You and I will stand
——————————————————————

It’s a song, so don’t expect too many pyrotechnics in the text. It’s supposed to be direct, straightforward and easily sung by vast crowds of very determined people.

Why I Don’t

WHY I DON’T

Watching or reading what they call the news
Puts the tiny blur of politics
Undeservedly centre stage

And time will pass – or we will pass through time
And old puns lose topicality
Or else be missed entirely

Watching or reading what they call the news
Is a part of popular culture
You might say: “the people’s culture”

And time will pass – or we will pass through time
Though probably only just scrape through
As revision’s out of fashion

In a culture – if you can call it that
That treats today as an ashtray, poor
Yesterday like a soiled tissue

That yesterday in which at last my dad
Was released from the war and came home
As hopeful as the Welfare State

And read the Mirror because he believed
It spoke for and to the working man
Had values and stood for something

These days my mother reads the dreary Mail
The Mirror – shameless, lobotomised
Laps at the gutter with the Sun

And who now recalls the year the party
Saw their vote for disarmament squashed
By their own elected leaders?

The rule of democracy – after all
Being useful only just as long
As people vote the way you want

Once in power you can do as you like
I couldn’t accept that even then
And come to think of it still can’t

But the world of politics – after all
Is one of those areas in which
Any fool can point out what’s wrong

And you’re a fool of a whole other kind
To think you can even imagine
Still less define what might be right

Yet there are times when I know there’s something
That can be embodied in our lives
And can inform the way we act

‘Cos politics is our use of power
In accord with the values we hold
And doesn’t require that we vote

Of what use to man or beast – after all
The options on an all meat menu
To a strict vegetarian?

The world is not to be found in a box
Or between the pages of a rag
It’s before our eyes day by day

Watching or reading what they call the news
Caveat emptor … smoke and mirrors
A weapon of mass distraction
——————————————————————

OK, so this was written in 2005, and also refers to events from the fifties, but – sadly – it has no less relevance in 2011. But the House of Lords’s decision on the NHS “reform” bill brought it to mind.

Beware the use of the word “reform”.

“Socrates said, ‘The misuse of language induces evil in the soul.’ He wasn’t talking about grammar. To misuse language is to use it the way politicians and advertisers do, for profit, without taking responsibility for what the words mean. Language used as a means to get power or make money goes wrong: it lies. Language used as an end in itself, to sing a poem or tell a story, goes right, goes towards the truth.”

Sorry, I couldn’t fathom out who originally penned these sentences. I can only hope (s)he is happy to see them broadcast further.

Manifesto For Revolution (not a poem at all)

Manifesto For Revolution

A. Revolution In Daily Practice

To work with others in a spirit of free cooperation to the extent of our capacity, to enter into debate with an open heart and mind, to read, to write, to share ideas, to play or listen to music, to explore the potentials of consciousness, to enter into authentic intimate relationships with others, to question received wisdom and to encourage, facilitate and support others to do so; these are the types of activity which comprise the revolutionary’s daily programme of tasks at our current point of political development.

B. The Overall Objective Of Revolution

The most powerful revolutionary act consists in the raising of an individual’s consciousness – and this may be one’s own or that of another – in the direction of an increased awareness, understanding and appreciation of the situation in which we find ourselves together, accompanied by the development of a self confidence in assuming personal responsibility for exercising a self directed moral autonomy in concert with the physical and social setting to the greater good of all.