Caution: the odd poem may contain swear words

CONTENTS: Your best shot / Beliefs / Life / Woke or wank? / Used to be… / Blinded / How much? / Fish n chips / Pluck / Those pesky homonyms… / No will / Hyped hippos who? / Happy daze / MRI / Lame brain blame / Manhandled / Resolution’s desolation row/ Who cares? / Festive overbyte / Woofers / Opinions / G-up, dumbed down / Turd list / The ‘Is it?’ algorithm / Someone I know / Christian or Histian? / Pourquoi? / Delusions / Right is might / Believe it or not? / Nostalgic lament / Cyclical / “Well Howdy do… Pardner?” / Ideas / The Cadbury F(l)ake / The ultimate known known conundrum / The edge / Luck, love and labour / Old / Logic 101 / Last rights / Oh… that? / Maaate! / Out / Ode to tired tryers:  tyres / You don’t say / Son of a …? / Hope / The causation oration / Mine / Buyer: unawares beware / To and from (with apologies to Bob…) The piteous emotion / Evolution’s synthetic revolution /The job / Lady luck / Love / The fog / Peaceful / The ‘S’ word / Dumb as bro… / Evacuation grab-bag / H / R.o.I / You a girl or something? / Fact or friction? / Syllables / Men / Ego ergo ignoranus / World famous / Mamma don’t want… / Readin’ / Mr Time / The ultimate known, known conundrum / Just wondering… / Que sera, no necesita sera / Numero uno / The walking handbag / Lemmings / Privacy piracy’s privacy / Feminequity / Standards? Make mine a double! / The bit / Two black crows

 

 

                   Your best shot

Some are born with innate talent

Wasted, lazy, unrealised and misspent

Others driven, practise, chase promised gain

Mistakes, disappointed, feel failure’s pain.

 

Whenever, whatever, always someone better

The need to win’s a loser’s mind fetter

Talent or training, having a go’s quest

Doing your best, is the better test.

 

Place, rating, score or quality

Incompleteness brings no jollity

No blame, no shame not beating the rest

Your best shot is, always doing your best.

 

 

            Beliefs

If I believe, is it true

Or just pretence I show you?

Do beliefs, make it real

Or how I deal with what I feel?

 

Do I believe simple falsehoods

Certainty bias from those ‘with’ the goods

Rather than nut out complex realities

Thus my conscience, mind it frees?

 

Do I believe ‘cos the book says so

Or is it gullible soil to hoe?

Do I believe just to fit in

Be in the team I think will win?

 

Do I believe ‘cos I wish it be

Or  don’t look, ‘cos I might see?

Do my beliefs fit some ideal

Or do I reject, what is real?

 

Are beliefs simply aspirational

Promote deeds as inspirational?

Do beliefs hijack integrity

Cause collapse of good society?

 

Are beliefs based on hopes

Rainbows chased by dopey myopes?

Do we believe, ‘cos they’re famous

When they’re just another ignoramus?

 

If I believe I’m in with the in crowd

Is reality, perception  veiled by smug shroud?

If I believe markets always rise

Time will ensure my capital’s demise.

 

Do I make believe I believe

To conceal, con those to perceive

‘Look over there!’ distract attention

My greedy profits, make no mention

 

Do I believe, in free speech

So to vilify, with nil impeach?

Then when the truth, catches me out

Make laws I believe, will silence their clout

 

If I stop believing but the phenomenon’s still there

Does this make it real, despite my lack of care?

Is denial of belief, in spite of being aware

The way I cope, avoid the nagging scare?

 

Do my beliefs subtlety change

To match my habitual behaviour range?

To ease two conflicted parts of my brain

Excuses soothe cognitive dissonance pain?

 

Are my beliefs in technology, consumption blind?

Viewed as progress, not exploiting, unkind

To Earth’s biomes, people, development at any cost

Resources, habitation, the future lost?

 

Are my beliefs selfish, self-serving

Immoral priority, over people’s welfare, unswerving?

Are my beliefs, values, ideologies unshakeable

‘Cos indoctrinated fear, my shaped psyche’s unbreakable?

 

If my choice is to have no beliefs

Am I at risk, inviting griefs?

Callous, amoral, uncaring, sad?

Or discerning, informed, values-add?

 

I think I’d rather understand

Than drown in flaky belief quicksand

See the evidence, facts first-hand

Then think, decide, guided, planned.

 

 

                                    Life

The soft breeze rustles the early morn

Birds and cicadas from slumber born

Brown leaves flutter to the ground

Useful past shed, compost bound.

 

No-one walks the same path twice

We’re not the same person: hindsight, advice

Older, wiser, or resentful, estranged

If one looks, the path has changed.

 

 

                         Woke or wank?

Proud to be called (it’s a badge of honour)

WOKE! Cos it means doing what’s proper

Guided by facts, concerned for folk’s future

Societies, biomes, planet secure.

 

The opposites: naught but self-interest

No care, a failed empathy test

All lies and greed, loathing and scorn

WANK! The new word, for the fugly hat worn.

 

 

                        Used to be…

Fingers used to point, at things, people, places

Now they swipe/tap text and faces

Used to be ‘Seeing is believing’

Now most things are deceiving.

People used to save to buy

Now it’s credit, never ask why

Used to be things were repaired, restored

Now dumped, replaced or ignored

Kids used to be, well, just kids

Neglect or driven now outbids

News used to be, credible, true

Media now spews corruption’s due

People used to be, generous, kind

Stressful life now makes them blind

Kids walked or pedalled all day

Now full throttle the e-scooter way

Used to be schools had bike racking

Now we have carpark wait-line stacking

We used to stand, for a fair go

Now we vilify those we don’t know

People once were happy, blessed with rest

Now they’re lonely and depressed

Used to be, deemed death and taxes

Unavoidability increasingly lapses

Used to be we had public servants

Now we have twice-the-cost private consultants

Used to be advice was frank and fearless

Pollies now complicit, corrupt n clueless

Used to be we had national interest decisions

Now we have lobbyist blood-sucking incisions

Used to be ‘latest’ was ‘greatest’

Now it’s just wealth and ‘look at me!’ statist

Used to be ‘unprecedented’ had meaning

Now things so frequent it’s lost its deeming

Honesty used to be an admired trait

Now it’s for losers’ jilted fate…

 

 

                              Blinded

There’s none so blind who will not see

None so ignorant as those who decree

Book-learnin’s a waste, so let me be

To grow older, not wiser, others to tell me

What to think, my beliefs for free

And join the flock with others who agree…

 

 

                        How much?

How much is some? Where to stop?

How much is nearly? All but a drop?

Where is somewhere? Yet to be found?

What is something? A bit lurking round?

When is someday? Faint hope’s denial?

What is whatever? More infinite trial?

How long’s a while? A test of patience?

When is soon? Knowing’s pretence?

How certain is maybe? Weighing best option?

When is whenever? A plan’s adoption?

How is however? Solution found never?

None whatsoever, no matter how clever.

Who is whoever? Lucky or chosen?

The more I wonder, the more I’m supposin’.

 

 

                      Fish n chips

Our cars, communications, our cash

Appliances all march to Binary hash

Etched micro-circuits on wafered Silicon

Our despot digital umbilical eon.

 

Miniaturized to atomic limits

Inscrutable beyond our finite wits

‘Lift the bonnet’ to inspect, repair?

Forget it, sole choice, is to swear.

 

The TV picture, died, screen black

Pulled it apart, plastic layered-screen stack

One dead ten-cent LED on just one strip

In series, so all dead, junk to the tip.

 

One tiny, unidentifiable glitch

Flips the unseen ‘No can do’ dead switch

Despite the machine, otherwise good

It’s junk, consigned to the dumpsterhood.

 

Imagine a human run by chips

A semiconductor gets the ‘blips’

A cracked fingernail stops everything

A fingernail file won’t restore the bling.

 

 

                       Pluck

Round and round the spider goes

Spindly legs and pick-up ‘toes’

Joining silk to radial threads

Plucking strings like fiddleheads

Driven by its genetic clock

Learning naught as Tick goes Tock

Laying eggs its only goal

Nature’s way: all heart, no soul.

 

                                         Those pesky homonyms…

If a don’t-knower is a vote NO-er, would they go on an ark with Noah in

Or arc up: “Where’s the detail?” because of his dark skin?

How much can a lesson lessen, or affect the effect of climate change

With profiteers given such free range?

Who knows what the nose knows, if the olfactory cell has naught to sell

‘Cos mucous, a cold, caused it to swell?

He’d do well to heed, having heard the herd

Or risk being labelled an arrogant turd.

If a nun gets none, no reason to moan, no pubes mown

Blind devotion to the known unknown.

Is Holy water wholly omnipotent as used by a priest’s sacrament done

But holey for a Nun who’s allowed to use none?

A flaw in the floor, but billed for a shonky build

Won’t pay if you are strong willed

Is it a fair fare, for such a feat with poor feet

A rickshaw takes ‘tourists’ to meet fresh meat?

Mine profit awe from ore, or eco-destroying oar

Greedy magnate just wants more.

Does the manner of decorum at the manor depend on things guessed by the guest

Or the alcohol drunk in quest?

He who went bald, bawled, rather than dye or die

With a comb-over raked on high.

When the flu virus flew up my flue, my nose I blew ’til blue

Days I spent, a miserable few.

Pare a bruised pear, you need a pair, to make up the loss

Of the brown stuff you toss.

How much did a maid need to knead dough for bread to be made

Before bread tin in oven be laid?

If one has won, is an idol ever idle

With elusive career to bridle?

How much has the collective groan grown, the political scent sent, not worth a cent

Given how high is people’s rent?

Does a lone prophet profit from a loan

Of public support’s positive tone?

Is the lion’s mane the main reason a lioness is pried from the pride

Or prowess the reason to hide?

Should a mouse pause on its paws, where in the past a cat has passed

Or just run very fast?

Does a flea not flee, on hearing its prey pray

‘Cos it knows that won’t work anyway?

If eight giant squid got ate by a whale

Does it beech itself on a beach and wail?

How dear is a deer, and is a doe worth more dough?

Don’t ask me; I’m just a dumb arse. I wooden no…

 

 

                           No will

Ready and able to make the change

Planned, scheduled, scope and range

Budget financed, source of billing

Chances lost, the greedy unwilling…

 

 

             Hyped hippos who?

Hypocrites come, hypocrites go

Doing, spouting, like they know

What’s right and proper, and what’s wrong

Critical, pious, same tired old song.

 

Any verb, adverb or glib adjective

Used to confect their fake narrative

Swap its antonym to make true

The corrected lie now applied to you.

 

No sooner said, apportioning blame

They play or deny having done, the same

Called out, guilty and exposed

Ignore, won’t see, innocence posed.

 

 

                        Happy daze

Aussie ‘burbs with their streets and parks

Trees defended by Magpie Larks

Gated driveways crossing footpaths

Barking dogs defend fenced-in rafts.

 

Silent walkers striding on past

Headphones, smartphones, staring downcast

Mothers with babies in posh prams

Passed by tradie ute’s anagrams.

 

Noisy jets drone by overhead

Airport lounges disgorged or fed

Taxis swarm like flies to a feed

Timetables,’ schedules,’ haste to heed.

 

Regular hush when lights turn red

Acceleration gearchange noisy dread

‘Hotted’ exhausts belch eardrum pain

Strapped in kids bear bogan Dad’s brain.

 

Cacophony pierced, then sirens fade

UberEats hot deliveries made

Night owl stragglers home to bed

Pre-dawn traffic’s sleepy head.

 

 

                              MRI

Boom boom, boom bippity boom

MRI soundtrack’s intimate gloom

Clickety-clack, click-clack, train track sound

Doofdoof, swish-swash aural profound.

If space music really does exist

Then techno beats will reign and persist

Dooryadoorya dot, staccato stops!

Synchronised glink with bleeping pops

Radiation goading, water protons sending

Magnetic field sensing, computer image pending.

 

 

Lame brain blame

Blame brain game
down-stepping dark aim
Deflecting blame
a half-the-time game
Always the same
someone else to blame
Apportioning blame
other half-the-time same.

Excuses became
delusional brain blame
Habitual frame
unless awareness became
The means to tame
the objecting frame
By admitting the game
thus emotions tame
And thus by aim
the end of the game.

 

 

                                       Manhandled

He: well-toned, tattooed, wearing only dick-stickers, phone in hand

Followed by young son and daughter, dick-stickers and bikini, tanned

Followed by Mum, dark Chador, both arms full: towels, beach paraphernalia

Got me wondering: patriarchy, religion, new generation: continued or failure?

 

The Western perception, democracy-enabled, progressive but hand-braked

Fighting Homophobia, sexism, gender-inequality, sincere or grudgingly faked

Espousing, enforcing by colonialism, capitalism, legislation or confected war

And Christian religions, denominations supplanting cultures there before.

 

But hang on! With most of the World’s sovereign population ruled by fears

Community and/or religious-based patrilineal controlling-group seers

With executions, prison for protesting gender inequality and women’s clothing

To the West’s bilateral nuclear family kinship system’s disgust and loathing.

 

But the West, enabling Christian private school systems designed to perpetuate

Patrilineal ideologies, by grooming, indoctrinating, supplies of future reprobate

To ensure wealth, privilege and power stays in the hands of the existing elites

Inequity, inequality, capitalism’s exploitation politically disguised as Christian beliefs.

 

With seventy-five percent of UN votes thus anti-Western culture and values

Collective non-Western moral conservatism, guided by non-Christian salutes

While right-wing ‘Christian’ zealots, campaigning to enslave Western ‘democracy’

Sexist, conservative male mindsets: the unified path to next World war’s kleptocracy.

 

 

              Resolution’s desolation row 

“Houston we’ve got a problem.” A famous quote

Our circumstance worse on our Earthly boat

Remedies clear, no consensus, attribution

You’re part of the problem if against the solution

 

 

              Who cares?

What will happen if I don’t care?

Worry less, less prone to swear?

Is caring an obligatory curse?

If I don’t, will it make things worse?

 

Tearing up at sad movie or song

Or plight of victims’ horrible wrong

Happy to be a bleeding-heart sook

Not psychopath ‘winner’ with the ‘look’.

 

 

         Festive overbyte 

Eight bits to the byte

Reams of code out of sight

Gives us virtual, digital delight

Family, grandkids via Skype

Or social means to effect slight

Promote evil, or what’s right

Or spend all day and the night

Surfing the net, infotainment lite

Boosting power and financial might

Of owners of, popular website

Mass-produced digital sleight

Leaving us in a weakened plight

Dating sites’ violent blight

And tech disruption’s creeping fright

Good versus bad, the continuing fight

Digital snow’s Merry Christmas white…

 

 

                    Woofers

Farking owners’ barking dogs

Shirking owners’ non-working cogs

Bored hounds’ ignored behaviour

Fenced-in poochs’ unchained saviour?

 

 

                      Opinions

Belief, relief, unsubstantiated

Comforting, suffocating, unalleviated

Ignorance, hindrance, unabbreviated

Perception deception, unexpurgated.

 

Don’t tell me your beliefs, uninvited

Tell me the facts, complete, unblighted

If you don’t know the facts, duly cited

Keep your opinions, unworthy, unsighted.

 

 

        G-up, dumbed down

Company, laughs, conversation?

Interaction, faces, observation?

No thanks, screen preoccupation

No more real, human mentation.

 

Smart phones, apps and smart TVs

Essential on today’s CVs

4G, 5G and getting smarter

Dumbed down by our own digital partner.

 

 

                      Turd list

Racist, sexist, cultist, misogynist

Egotist, elitist, and recidivist

Integritist, kindist, careist not heard

Wordlist reserved for the unpunished turd.

 

 

      The ‘Is it?’ algorithm

Is it factual, evidence base?

Peer reviewed, by trusted place

Is it sanctioned and procedural?

Regulated and constitutional

Is it ethical or dodgy, immoral?

Behavioural standards, and of principle

Is it trustworthy, authentic source?

Photoshop, avatars, bots in force

Is it equitable, plainly fair?

Gender, race, age, costs to bear

Is it future-proof, use sustained?

Environment and resources gained

Is it needed, or want-based?

Consumerism, unrecyclable waste.

 

In these times of information overload

Fake news, influencers, designed to goad

Many give up, don’t want to know, old

After ‘the event:’ “Why wasn’t I told?”

Others sucked in: the confirmation bias club

Demonstrations, terrorism, despot-voter hub

And the gullible punters, ripped off by the greedy

Plus growing ignorance, less care for the needy

Controlling media barons hijacking mindsets

‘Journos,’ Pollies, compounding their assets

Time for an Algorithm to sort murky shelves

AI to rescue humans from themselves…

 

 

                   Someone I know

“I know a person who…” a common call

Implies a ‘person’ met, in life’s trawl

A workmate, relative, friend or neighbour

With insights, likes, disdain or abhor

But those you follow on Twitter, Fakebook

Cos the stuff folks post for all to look

Reveals their persona, foibles, traits

Is ‘someone you know’ a legit equate?

And go the next step and claim as friend

Unmet, unseen, the permanent trend?

 

 

           Christian or Histian?

Tinker/Tailor, Soldier/Sailor

Rich man/Poor man, Beggar man/Thief

All live life with some vague belief.

 

Loving/Hating, Devoted/Cheat

Moral/Evil, Humility/Conceit

Which traits describe, Christian or Elite?

 

Honest/Liar, Kindness/Callous

Generous/Greedy, Caring/Malicious

With which are non-Christians likely synonymous?

 

Humble/Arrogant, Benevolent/Malevolent

Sincere/Hypocrite, Humane/Politician

Christian/non-Christian or LNP: Histian?

 

 

                              Pourquoi?

Why do we misuse such a clever brain?

Why treat nature, the planet with disdain?

Why do undeserveds get so much acclaim?

Why do we believe things whose truth not a grain?

Why does god’s will make people insane?

 

Why can’t people see, political will’s all feign?

Why does concern, compassion so quickly wane?

Why are we obsessed with the completely inane?

Why do suckers, rich people’s wars, take all the pain?

Why do such liars, recidivists, their trust maintain?

 

Why are innocent kids society’s bloodstain?

why are decent people screwed over in the main?

Why do crooked CEO’s never have to explain?

Why are society’s problems so blindingly plain?

Why did Leonard Cohen never get to reign?

 

Why is the universe’s origin so arcane?

Why are we surprised at each new virus strain?

Why is there advantage in being so vain?

Why do we accept the place of those on the gravy train?

Why is revolution the start of the next campaign?

 

Why is decency so damned hard to sustain?

Why are whistleblowers forced to refrain?

Why do unimportant things burst the splenetic vein?

Why do modern war crimes not lead to arraign?

Why is the question not spat back: no, you please explain?

 

Why do hypocrites exposed, blatantly remain?

Why does ‘progress’ create the planet’s casualty moraine?

Why is porn humanity’s biggest eyestrain?

Why do we think, the status quo will, the planet maintain?

Why are we ruled by the testosterone daisy chain?

 

Why will humanity perish, while drinking champagne?

Why did life’s progenitor choose the cell membrane?

Why is people’s greed nature’s Lindane?

Why are pretenders perceived as cool, urbane?

Why is intelligent design the cause of migraine?

 

Why so many ‘christians’  from goodness refrain?

Why does an imaginary friend so easily enchain?

Why is truth elusive, hard to ascertain?

Why does history repeat, again and again?

Why is joy, not money, the best capital gain?

 

Why is trashing our planet not seen as profane?

Why are empathy, caring, morals now so on the wane?

Why do beliefs run rampant, over facts’ domain?

Why do people desist, then loudly complain?

Why are humans so, despicably inhumane?

 

Chorus:

Why? why? The little kids ask why?

Sigh. Oh my, it’s who cares, not why.

 

 

                                Delusions

I’m not an alcoholic, I’m just a heavy drinker

Pipsqueak squeezed pimple, I’m an empirical thinker

I only have a flutter, my losses are responsible

My diet is shit, my health problems logical

I waste so much money, why’m I always broke?

Always such a wanker, but I’m still a great bloke.

 

 

          Right is might

The right hand fits a glove

The right traits induce love

The right clothes flatter a figure

The right aim pulls a trigger

 

The right food prolongs a life

The right needs met keeps a wife

The right key turns a lock

The right person, you, someone’s rock

 

The right science brings a cure

The right relationships, healthy brains endure

The right awareness solves a problem

The right support is always welcome

 

The right ethics may not win

The right respect gained avoids chagrin

The right genes means positive potential

The right nurture, else problems existential.

 

 

Believe it or not?

Dry water?

Someone oughta!

 

Warm snow

Doesn’t glow.

 

Solid air?

Do declare!

 

Square circle

Or heterocercal?

 

Cushioned concrete?

Headfirst meet.

 

Paid volunteer

Deserved sneer

 

Intelligent life?

Problems rife.

 

But clean coal?

Truth’s own goal.

 

 

                               Nostalgic lament

Sadly we remember when, we recall them really well

Longed-for secure comforts, treasured stories to tell

When daily high tides rose, stopping at the beach

Drowned leafy suburbs, flooded beyond reach

Cooling summer breezes, beneath shady trees

And walks through long-gone forests; yes bloody please!

When kids all had a future, not a living hell

Grandkids were a cherished hope, future dreams to sell

Tropical beaches, islands, girt by colourful reef

Coral gardens gone, old footage summons grief

Old scenic photos, painful now, curious kids to show

No clue, puzzled looks, no recognition to know

Clear crisp air, green horizons, jutting to blue sky

Now constant grey-brown smoke haze, panoramas die

And insect calls and bird songs, now Nature’s silent spring

Countless plants and animals, now a dead museum thing

How we wish, how we could’a, should’a voted liars last

Chances lapsed, all collapsed, now daze of the coming past…

 

 

                                                 Cyclical

For what do people fight hardest, to get and protect?

Truth? Democracy? Power? Anything perfect?

Wars, invasion, murder, slavery, oppression and ecocide

Their success brings wealth, but also it’s own downside.

 

Ego, arrogance, complacency, waste and largesse’s allure

Success germinates within itself, its own seeds of failure

Whose cycle brings hardship, desperation and inventiveness

For people, families, nations, the new seeds of success.

 

 

     Well howdy do… pardner?

Demanding, controlling, abusive

Or selfless, assuring, supportive?

 

Sneaky, cheating, deceitful

Or honest, open, dependable?

 

Doubting, argumentative, negative

Or patient, trusting, positive?

 

Distant, dismissive, avoidant

Or close, cuddly, affectionate?

 

Selfish, lazy, enslaving

Or generous, helpful, caring?

 

Sexist, racist, ignorant

Or fair, informed, tolerant?

 

Grogging, gaming, gambling

Or grown up, saving, investing?

 

Angry, judgemental, hypercritical

Or fair-minded, calm, rational?

 

Secretive, evasive, blaming

Or open, intimate, accepting?

 

Amoral, snide, nil probity

Or values, morals, integrity?

 

Chances of meeting, life partner greeting

Shot clock ticking, choices picking

 

Complex aspects, varied prospects

Having to choose, sometimes you lose

 

Don’t sweat the small stuff, think fair enough

Patient overlooking, not snotty sooking

 

No-one’s perfect, blameless suspect

Sort out differences, partner preferences

 

Toxic childhood, issues not good

Fault not yours, but your job to fix sores

 

The damaging others bit, if your mind, you don’t fix it

You transition through, the point where fault is due

 

Acknowledge, own it, seek help to fit

No need for a mind, if not the changeable kind

 

Wants versus needs, promise versus deeds

Fix own flaws, massage other’s lores

 

Goals to assimilate, needs to accommodate

If no reciprocate, time to vacate…

 

 

                     Ideas

What do you call a deer with no eyes?

No idea or a no-eye deer?

How do ideas impact our lives?

How do ideas spontaneously appear?

 

A virtual light bulb, a flash, a spark?

Conscious cognition or sub-conscious dreams?

DNA triggered from its slumber park?

Or neural synapses forming teams?

 

What prompts or motivates endless ideas?

Spare time for thinking, quiet introspection?

Acclaim and fame, with popular cheers?

Or comfort, necessity, money, perfection?

 

Are ideas clever, average or dumb?

Eye of beholder, or right for the time?

Inappropriate, but may become

Wildly successful if tweaked to prime?

 

Every idea, that’s ever been conceived

With one person’s, insight or thought

More good than evil, thus believed

Evolution’s triumph, own redundancy wrought?

 

And to these ideas will humans succumb?

Computers, robots, stronger, faster, smarter

Artificial intelligence, our lives overcome

A smart idea to limit A.I. by charter?

 

 

                  The Cadbury F(l)ake

Fake tan, fake hair, fake nails, fake reality

Fake smile, fake charm, fake emotions, personality

Fake life, fake friends, fake love, fake nicety

Cheating, malicious, the only real finality.

 

Can’t fake it forever, doing devoteds wrong

So those who get hurt say, “Bye, so long.”

So fake it, never make it, not belong

While others get on, self-doubt gone.

 

 

The ultimate known known conundrum

‘There is no reality, just perception!’

Which depends on fact reception

In turn determined by rejection

Of facts, as beliefs filter perception!

 

Ignorance, unknown knowns, confirmation bias

Damaged psyches, pre-set emotions and liars

Fake news, complicit media, and corruption

mis-guided values, Earth’s inevitible destruction?

 

But geosystems, nature have no such interdiction

Just reality and its conclusive prediction

Will it sway this human affliction

In time to stay our valediction?

 

 

           The edge

Two sides to every story

Hard path to, acclaim or glory

Heads or tails, coin tossed, spinning

Fear of loss, desire of winning.

 

The edge of the coin, seldom seen

Furtive, nasty, unleashed and mean

Partners, familiars, victims glean

Sorry glimpses of self-demean.

 

Two to tango, arguments, fights

Both sides cogent, trampled rights

Edge of the coin, smooth or rough

Genes? Conditioned? Or childhood tough?

 

 

Luck, love and labour

What qualities do, parents desire

Their kids to have, to be a high flier?

Intelligence? Looks? Athletic ability?

Work ethic? Honesty? Or just plain happy?

Good health? Assertive, dominant or empathy?

 

Which of these traits, be your top three pick?

Which are life’s lottery? Or parental control stick?

How many won or lost, life circumstance?

Or lucky born with, a full suite by chance?

From bad luck, improve one, for success, finance?

 

Do some combinations have multiplier effect?

Or some attract trouble, unless you suspect?

Or result from nurture, a chance-met mentor?

Good parents, informed, guided and cared for?

In hindsight, your life: what’s your sum score?

 

 

                                     Old

‘How old is it?’ Common question. ‘Just curious.’

The answer triggers judgements, thoughts not spurious

Valued, not valued, ambivalence in between

Old people, for example, sighted but unseen.

 

Things transition, costly to priceless with age

Tempered by their place on the rarity gauge

Or owner’s position and celebrity status

Or chance re-discovery from a long-lost hiatus.

 

Most things old, obsolete, valueless

Disposed of, unless possessing a nostalgic bless

Or in mint condition, or famous, museum bound

History preserved, for the obscure, common, uncrowned.

 

Old things of value, must prove their provenance

With fakes, frauds, problems with governance

Or old wine, found corked when sampled, worthless

Or of such quality or purpose, considered ageless!

 

Cars depreciate, dilapidate to abandonment

Rusty wrecks rescued, restored, with lavished intent

Resprayed, original colours, paraded with pride

High value, loved, cared for, death denied.

 

Old societies sheltered, and fed the aged

Experience, wisdom, cures, securely caged

Older people now, regarded, dismissed as too old

Respect, endearment, until really old, tightly controlled.

 

 

        Logic 101

If truth has no value

Then lies are currency

Else hindsight is truth’s latency.

 

If God is all knowing

Then neglect is showing

Else all is myth bestowing.

 

If heaven exists

Then hell is on Earth

Else living has little worth.

 

If virginity equals femininity

Then divinity boosts masculinity

Else affinity raises our sanguinity.

 

If today, everyday is a gift

Then tomorrow’s gift is delayed history

Else yesterday’s gift is pure mystery.

 

If history’s how we organise ignorance of the past

Then memory modifes to suit our own cast

Else imagination’s unsurpassed.

 

If childhood is innocence

Then parenthood’s to blame

Else nature not nurture is lame.

 

If greed is good

Then giving is bad

Else human nature’s been had.

 

If education’s the solution

Then ideology’s the problem

Else humans: no future for them.

 

If thinking needs knowing

Then believing is ignorance sowing

Else result is consequence growing.

 

If the masses experience preconception

Then power is held by deception

Else elites have perfect perception.

 

If populism wins

Then reality’s lost

Else perception is welcome impost.

 

If you’re always right

Then I’m always wrong

Else logic never, did belong.

 

 

                  Last rights

How long would the list be, if you persist

To write the world’s wrongs?

Does concern, the will exist

To right the world’s wrongs?

 

Is perception present, understanding, awareness

To know, right from wrong?

Injustice, inequality, fairness

The right to right the wrong.

 

 

                   Oh… that?

Good times, sad times, yesteryear

Old love’s newness brings a tear

Should’a, could’a, didn’t, recalled regret

Chance lapsed, denied, never to forget.

 

Wondering what would’a, hindsight’s re-run

Satisfied or better life, or elusive fun?

Old paint, faded photos, flyspots on a wall

Memories retreating, reminiscing’s trawl.

 

 

                   Maaate!

Self-centred, selfish, one of the boys

Grumpy at home with bullying ploys

Anything, everything, always annoys

Denying family of entitled joys.

 

Weekends, nights, whenever it suits

Away, enjoying purchased pursuits

Grogging with sexist, like-minded brutes

Then home expecting a wife with the cutes.

 

Old age, disease, then catches up

Expecting attention like some new pup

No-one cares, on his pity to sup

Sympathy drained from his now-empty cup.

 

 

                                 Out

In tennis comps, one is ‘bundled out’

Beaten in sets, eliminated by the match winner

In cricket, the umpire, you’re ‘given out’

Caught, bowled, run-out, stumped

With baseball, you’re emphatically ‘out!’

Caught, fouled, struck or run-out

In love, you’ve ‘fallen out’

Disillusioned, cheated-on, abused, abandoned

If you’re gay, you nervously ‘come out’

Poor you, ostracised, but good on yer, good luck

If you’re bullied, exploited, abused, you ‘get out’

Can be a victim, or get on with life stronger

If NOT right wing, you lie, collude, you’re ‘called out’

Vilified if female, non-white, minority, poor

When a cool dude, connected, you ‘hang out’

Hoping no-one twigs, you’re a shallow pretentious wanker

When your evil past goes public you’re ‘caught out’

So you lie, deny, victim shame, cover your tracks

But when you’re normal, likeable, got a clue, you ‘luck out’

No windfall, no rich daddy, just reward, for being you…

 

 

          Ode to tired tryers: tyres

One single shape and monochrome drape

Of black or black, no blue, brown nor red

All the same, with their wan hollow gape

Round donuts, no squares, just chiselled tread

Their sidewalls displayed with code never read.

 

These tireless conveyors of flesh and steel

All but ignored once bought and fitted

No polish, not fed, no thought: how they feel?

Nor care for surfaces against which pitted

Once blown, discarded, the roadside littered.

 

It is a hard life for miles and miles

With potholes and bumps and tar-glued stones

Ahhh…rubberised bitumen, break out the smiles

It’s smooth and soft, with dulcet calm tones

Enough to soothe, their cold steel bones.

 

But picture the pain and shock and terror

Layers of tread going wasted as smoke

The howl of spun rubber no fluke or error

The simple result of some brainless bloke

Who’ll whinge next week that now he’s broke.

 

Obedient tyres, they have no real choice

Comply in silence, obey the command

Of foot on pedal, not even voice

In safe assurance, or drunken demand

It’s life’s cruel compact not even yarned.

 

Then one day in wonder, it’s plain to see

“These tyres are stuffed; how can it be?

How many K’s? Were they good value?”

Buy them again? Where’s someone to tell you?

 

Roughly removed from nonchalant rims

Rolled to the dump without any thanks

Discarded in piles of jumbled dark trims

Or washed up stranded, on old river banks

Despised as now, mozzie farm tanks.

 

No respite retirement, baked in the sun

Or buried damp darkness far from the top

It’s suffer in silence, their life is not done

No solace in service, of not going pop!

Would’a been better, to be a big flop.

 

So it’s on and on with some vain hope

Of some useful future, anything but this

Recycled, re-used, a retaining-wall slope

A shelter for snakes, their home-coming hiss

Even to burn would be one final bliss.

 

But all that worn, rubber dust goes

Settling in gutters, every tick of the clock

To ocean floors via storm drain flows

Buried in sediment, stone secret to unlock

Awaiting discovery, bouncy rebound rock?

 

 

        You don’t say…

‘It’s just so surreal’

Response to reveal

‘It is what it is’

Intelligence quiz

‘We are what we are’

Obvious story so far

‘Life is for living.’

Thanks for nothing advice giving.

‘It’s just one of those things.’

Rational thinking’s cessation brings

‘It’s been a real roller coaster.’

Hindsight’s everything explanation poster.

Been there, done that’

Making life’s resume fat

‘Tomorrow’s another day.’

‘Wouldn’t have it any other way.’

Can’t think, what to say?

Bring a cliché into play.

 

 

             Son of a …?

Psychopath, narcissist, con-man, thief

The name to shame implies belief

His mother’s the culprit for giving birth

Son of a bitch, Son of a whore’s spoken dearth.

 

If he’s decent, he’s a son of a gun

But if a Murdoch, a real evil one

His mother, a kind, generous soul

Blameless father, a proper arsehole!

 

 

                                  Hope

If fear trumps the chance, of some possible reward

Decisions and consequences, thus swayed in life’s accord

So what role plays hope, and its opposite: despair?

An antidote, or purveyor, disappointment to wear?

 

With hope to cling to, comes mind-set, positive thinking

The will to go on, things better, future reward inkling

Despair is banished, subconscious cellar dweller

For now, rays of hope, negative rain’s umbrella.

 

Combine fear and hope, the power to deceive

With promises, undeliverable, no intention, reprieve

False hope believed, deliverance, saviour, no more abuse

After-life, real life, canny con men seduce.

 

When things hoped for, strived for, even feverishly desired

But objective denied or lost, hope dashed, dreams retired

Despair bounds forth, with agony, anger, sadness the toll

Even suicide’s twenty-minute window, threatening mind poll.

 

But the vapours of hope, still there to condense

Re-liquefy, re-focus, the joy of living, life’s recompense

Something, someone, family, friend or stranger

It doesn’t take much. Hope trumps despair’s danger.

 

 

    The causation oration

Hampered by procrastination

And life’s daily constipation

Hooked by futile anticipation

Conned by godly promised salvation

Blind faith in supplication

Saved or starved by innovation

Unemployed by automation

Living in a dumb-arsed nation

Overrun by greed’s salivation

Populist pollie’s lying oration

Helped by donor’s exploitation

Clueless: no investigation

Cowered by interrogation

Aided by democracy’s abdication

Distracted by, media sensation

End-game: people’s conformation

Diseased by coughing’s exhalation

Helping daily Earth’s cremation

Growing global consternation

And by empathy’s exhumation

Human nature’s recalibration

Sparked by poverty’s plain privation

Lured by hope’s emancipation

Spurred by rebellion’s slow gestation

Corporate greed’s expurgation

Solved by protest’s confrontation

Fuck the elitists’ indignation!

 

 

                     Mine

I

Me

Mine,

Not

You

Yours

His,

I own responsibility, dilemma that it is.

 

I

Me

Mine,

Not

Language

Script

Voice,

In order to be honest, I have to own my choice.

 

I

Me

Mine,

Not

Hers

Ours

Theirs,

I have to live by principle, as someone who cares.

 

I

Me

Mine,

Not

Who

What

Where,

My private thoughts alone, make not a cross to bear.

 

I

Me

Mine,

Not

How

When

Why,

My feelings and emotions, not ways to reason by.

 

I may not be to blame,

Excuses mostly lame,

But in the end I am,

Responsible for the sham.

 

Admitting to my choices,

Despite admonishing voices,

I can readily hide, my deepest inner thought,

But can’t disguise emotions, as faces do distort.

 

I am my own person. Why?

Cos me and upright pronoun, I

Own the single unalienable right

To think and choose, what’s plainly in sight.

 

So use your frontal cortex

Control the emotional vortex

You mostly get one chance

It’s rarely happenstance.

 

 

 

             Buyer: unawares beware

Human ingenuity, skill, never ceases to amaze

On cleverness, patience, imagination to gaze

Knives, scissors, abandoned war truck springs beautified

Sleek fashion shoes, street factory stall, only hand tools utilized.

 

Some things are not made, designed for viewing

More mechanical, functional, reliability pursuing

None-the-less provoke awe, complex or simple

Solution to problem, applied thinking, elegant, nimble.

 

And so to consumer goods, mass produced, marketed

Unaware buyers, impractical thinkers, duly targeted

Houses, vehicles, (uncomfortable) fashion: perception, appearance

Thin stereo speakers, nice furniture, but shit sound performance.

 

Once there were toilets, and separate bathrooms

Now they’re combined, more trendy, one assumes

Faecal aerosols, each flush floats new plumes

To settle on your toothbrush, ignorance blooms.

 

So what defines quality, buy right, buy once

Longevity, reliable, sound materials, not design-fault dunce?

Usefulness, design the key, a mark of true gumption

Aesthetics a bonus, when form follows function.

 

 

         To and from

(with apologies to Bob…)

We turn our face to find the breeze

Caress both cheeks, know direction with ease

We name the wind, by direction it comes

From the East, an Easterly, stirs leaves of gums.

 

We look at a current, to see where it goes

Naming it thus, to where it flows

Certain delivery, known answers to find

Downstream’s deposits, solutions mined.

 

We look to the wind to see what it brings

An ill wind forebodes, a cool breeze sings

The QUESTIONS my friend, are blowin’ in the wind

Choose the wrong answers: our futures to rescind.

 

 

          The piteous emotion

Conniving, duplicitous, deceptive

Toxic, and falsely receptive

Malicious: being a hurtful shit

And feeling good, happy about it

Sad, small-minded, pathetic misfit

To pity not hate, the best bit.

 

 

             Evolution’s synthetic revolution

As cultural evolution accelerates and outpaces

Our genetic evolution, barely changed, in stasis

But despite the growing gap, social V imperative

Our daily dealings ruled, by things primitive.

 

Our reptilian brain, palaeolithic, limbic by name

Lurking, surveillance, our best interests the aim

But the threats perceived, subconscious, response

The plains of Africa, hunter nomads, genes thus ensconced.

 

The present-day threats: loneliness, exclusion, postings

The media, new norms, racism, sexism, public roastings

Homophobia, bigotry, all take their toll

Anxiety, stress, mental health, lives lose control.

 

Add the research, funding, evil, technology of war

Robotics, no conscience, terrorism’s festering sore

Only chance for the human race future

Understand, educate people, about human nature.

 

Genetic imperatives, inherent, our subconscious brains

Nothing noticed, recalled, ’til subconscious register of importance reigns

Childhood experience modifies gene predispositions

Education, awareness, the self-help toolbox, for curative transitions.

 

And aiding, even urging this plague of convenience

Technology perpetuating, demand-driven prevenience

Resulting unhappiness, despair and violence

Subconscious feelings, birthed sounds of silence.

 

So dependent on technology, as a species, we’ve become

A cataclysm removes the basics? Survival only for some.

Third-world subsistence, old culture to the fore

Climate change potential: extinction or saviour’s door?

 

 

               The job

“G’day mate. What do you do?”

Defining reply of you are who?

Altered perceptions on answer depends

Interest, respect, acceptance, stipends?

 

Little insect climbing up wall

Non-descript tree, no enthral

Ancient bacteria, not even seen

What’s their job, their niche been?

 

Is mundane utility worth no respect

When stellar, importance is all circumspect?

Is salary the determinant of people’s kudos?

Is ordinary expendable, of no loss?

 

Covid-19, jobs splatter like rain

Households and business: financial pain

Perception filtered by infection potential

A sudden focus on jobs essential.

 

Sunset industries, jobs redundant

Technology’s march, old needs not abundant

But nature’s different on job extinction

Lost insignificants, affects all, no distinction.

 

             Lady luck

I chance to ponder on what is luck

Is it winning or losing? A rare stray fuck?

Or dodging a bullet in not getting stuck

With a drunk in a bar whose misfortune has struck?

 

Or dodging death in not coming down

With a virus, pandemic mismanaged by a clown?

Or secrets covered up, no talk of the town

Mates in places, no source of renown?

 

A driver who misses a crash by inches

Would reckon good fortune ebbs in pinches

Of thin air by chance, versus intended cinches

His driving now nervous, nuanced by flinches.

 

And those who spout about luck: “Make yer own”

Without crystal ball would surely moan

“Should’a been me, time and place had I known

Was nothing but arse, not deeds they have sown.”

 

So what of chance meeting, or fortunes made

From findings so rare, or some random trade

Is it all destiny, probability decayed

Or simply reward for those unafraid?

 

With humans on Earth, two hundred thou years

From twenty thou ancestors, each of us appears

Had just one died, you wouldn’t be here

To call that luck, no-one can sneer.

 

That were lucky: no broken neck in the ruck

No snotty-nosed kid to say that “You suck”

Maybe I’ll chance it and try for a fuck

No surprise there; it’s just Lady Luck…

 

 

                 Love

What is this thing called love, we ask

And so, we’re told

It’s just, like gold

You can never get enough of it

It’s always been the trend to commit

And so, we’re told

In times, of old

‘twas in its glory to bask.

 

It’s not like fear, a simple emotion

And so, we’re told

By scientists, bold

But part of the brain, to do with reward

When feelings ‘tween two, are in accord

And so, we’re told

A sight to behold

This mutual display of devotion.

 

So hard to find, first sight for some

And so, we’re told

In magazines sold

Date websites spruik, the great, the one and only

Load o’ crap, or just a trap, for predators and the lonely

And so, we’re told

In order to fold

Our opinions or cash, hope’s deep depths to plumb.

 

Socialized media: builds high expectation

And so, we’re told

Emotional blindfold

We all have foibles, be pains in the arse

Perceive, admit, compromise, surpass

And so, we’re told

For real love to enfold

Help each other be better people, love’s verbal ligation.

 

The lack of intimate love, denied

And so, we’re told

Research threshold

The effects are deleterious

Heart disease, afflictions serious

And so, we’re told

As medics scold

Health benefits of love betide.

 

But when love goes crash, or years slow

And so, we’re told

No longer to hold

It brings a melancholy sickening

An acute dismay, no playful pulse a-quickening

And so, we’re told

By cocky cuckold

I’ve now got your old inner glow.

 

The utter despair, when we can’t fix the rages

And so, we’re told

Sad feelings rolled

Into helpless thoughts and inaction

Hurtful things said, too late for redaction

And so, we’re told

With hindsight doled

From self-help books writ by sages.

 

But Oh the pleasure, well beyond measure

And so, we’re told

When we’ve banished the cold

And re-birthed the white peace dove

There’s nothing above, the return of love

And so, we’re told

Don’t break the mould

It’s vitally precious, so treat it like treasure.

 

The fog

Still, stark, silent, seeping

Weary, worn-out, watchful, weeping

Hopeless, hard-hearted, hurtful, haunting

Desolate, despairing, daily, daunting

Aching, ageing, agonising, artless

Lifelong, listless, lingering…

Loneliness…

 

                   Peaceful

Walking the beach, people come and go

Some striding it out, others slow

Glimpsed between the coconut palms

Holding hands or cranking arms.

 

Mostly pairs in conversation

Resolute stares or animation

Countless waves slosh on the beach

Breeze-like thoughts out of reach.

 

Busy lives in suspension

Getaway places without tension

Murmuring palms stare like they know

Living the dream is patiently slow…

 

 

             The ‘S’ word

People think their money’s kept, in a safe in the bank

Governments kept our money safe, with a gold reserve plank

Now it’s just binary digits, safe as a line of computer code

It’s safety only as good as that, of a government’s promise mode.

 

Cars are made to be the safest, now a selling point

ANCAP, UCSR score and rank, so boastfully anoint

Advertising lists of features, acronyms abound

Must-have safety now prestige, price no longer crowned.

 

And online safety, constant threat, many a tale of woe

Workplace Health and Safety rules, strict compliance tiptoe

Domestic appliance, consumer products, food as well all safe

Health procedures in the cue, else litigation’s chafe.

 

More and more, with complex life, we all expect, insist

Someone, somewhere, somehow, ensures our safety list

Designed and tested, inspected, detected, their responsibility

To think, pre-empt, engineer, outsmart, our ignorant fallibility.

 

Not so Oz Indigenous language, ‘safe’ was not a word

Their outlook and their culture, other words were heard

Many words for vigilant, responsible and alert

Looking out for threats, self and others, dangers to avert.

 

So the modern world progressive, technology to the fore

So many ways our safety changed, down to whim or war

Sensors, surveillance, systems, data screaming “More!”

We safely creep to our doom: climate extinction’s door…

 

 

                  Dumb as bro…

The news on planet Zog: their distant galactic discovery?

‘Blue planet life forms sabotage their own recovery!’

Perfect distance for their Sun’s light and heat

Life forms support humans, resource needs meet.

 

In spite of this bliss, their main goal is wealth

In so many ways, it threatens their health

The climate, the air, water, oceans and soil

Knowingly poisoned for wealth from others’ toil.

 

Despite chance of comfort, a sustainable path for all

They rush to destruction, a cataclysmic fall

And in the process cheered, and spurred by ego

Billions to find a way, off to Mars they go.

 

Now think about that, destroy a choice habitat

For a dead planet, whose history’s exactly that

Of what Earth’s will be, overheated, destroyed

Current life forms, existence, null and void.

 

Now freezing, no air, water, not even enough light

To split water, start food chains, photosynthesis’ might

So no plants, no food, no oxygen unless

Grown indoors, heated, plus electric light access.

 

On Earth they wage wars and terrorist attacks

Over whose imaginary friend, supremacy lacks

They inhale toxic smoke from burning chopped leaves

Die horrible death then, from predictable disease.

 

And leaders of tribes threaten nuclear buttons

Missiles and bombers launched, by ego-crazed gluttons

Six hundred million dead in the first strike

Then nuclear winter kills the rest, plants and humans alike.

 

With many other examples of continued self harm

Despite awareness and solutions, available like balm

They have the hide to proclaim, an intelligent life form

Objective analysis of their paralysis, deserves nothing but scorn.

 

 

             Evacuation grab-bag

Bushfire, flood, tsunami or plane crash

Get out fast, forget possessions and the stash

Things of value can be replaced

But not a life however displaced.

 

Those who proclaim to be in the know

To those of faith, their hopes to grow

‘The second coming soon will happen!’

Ascension to heaven, chosen ones flappin.’

 

So how will they grapple, grasping arms wide?

Their wealth, possessions, investment guide

Jewellery, art, wardrobe and phone

Gold bars, fancy car, house! On their own?

 

If the answer is: ‘Won’t need them in heaven.’

My reply: ‘Why need them now, prosperity’s leaven?’

Left behind to be snaffled by ‘sinners’

Wondering who’re the grinners and winners…

 

 

                                  H

Gimme an aitch, up goes the cry

Our senses alert as we wonder why

This single letter, chosen to start

A word of importance, about to impart

A cue to the crowd to chant their part.

 

A difficult consonant, hard to learn

With multiple phonic, sounds to discern

There’s “H” as in HEY, but also in WHEY

“H” as in FISH and don’t forget THURSDAY

With BOUGH and TROUGH both hard to say.

 

Shaped like a rugby, football goal post

Many a starting, word it can boast

Chair minus lower “h” just becomes care

Or take away “C”, it’s nothing but hair

So combine it to make, a most useful pair.

 

“H”, the cross-section shape, of, vagina relaxed

But “O” shape and cry, many a sigh, now, by phallus climaxed.

And “H” on the helipad shows where to land

Dial triple “O”, swift help is on hand

To whisk you to hospital; where suitably scanned.

 

So give us an aitch, don’t insult me by

Doubling the “haitch”, an ignorant cry

To you I’ll reply by way of a yell

Mind your aitches, “p’s/q’s” do sell

Learn them wisely. They’ll serve you well.

 

 

                                R.o.I

Negative interest rates, have been in the news

Nothing new there, if you’ve got the blues

Emotional deposits in one-way relationships

Rejection and loneliness: Return on Investment scrips.

 

        You a girl or something?

Pity poor females, with tresses and curves

Their ‘inherent weakness, hysterical nerves’

Rated on looks, not skills nor brains

Sexism rampant, and period pains.

 

Married as girls, no education

Disrespected, bashed, no hesitation

They mother, nurture, clean, cook and slave

Who remembers, what they selflessly gave?

 

Just one percent owned, of the world’s wealth

Most often victims, of the poorest health

Burdened and bullied, with childbirth and sex

Sold into slavery, to please Mr. X.

 

Misogyny reigns, (denied by most men)

Despair versus hope, (decided by men)

Oppressed and repressed, (mostly by men)

Guise of religion, (invented by men).

 

The caring professions, they fill the ranks

No high-paid finance jobs, in cushy banks

Low paid, lesser paid, unequal pay

Even science research, contracts day to day.

 

Two steps backwards and one step forward

Countless examples of careers cornered

Pregnant, childcare, or boys’ club glass ceiling

Need empathy, help, for girls, with feeling.

 

Female astronauts, trained for Apollo

Not one went to space, yet aced men hollow

On psych tests, trials, yet deemed too much risk

Might go to pieces, if things get too frisk.

 

So to the future, as global risks rise

Narcissists, DV, morals amortize

Neglect, abuse, inequality, lies

Funds for help cut, despite desperate cries.

 

So artificial wombs may be of help

Free of the burden and health risks pre-yelp!

And android ‘partners’ for unworthy men

To mistreat at will, we’ll care not when.

 

                Fact or friction?

Cringe, deny, arguments insipid

Nixon said, ‘Facts are stupid!’

Caught out, exposed, media harassing

Facts can also be embarrassing.

 

Too real, too awful, or too threatening

Facts can also be inhibiting

Weird, awesome, obscure, challenging

To some they’re also intriguing, interesting.

 

New science facts, revealing, useful

Our future, guided, nurtured, hopeful?

Recorded, recalled, recognized, heeded

They can prevent, history repeated.

 

Overlooked, blinded, masked by cupid

Judgements, in love, facts not lucid

Amnesia, dementia, facts non-existent

Politics, greed, facts now subsistent.

 

Are entrenched beliefs a greater threat

To truth than lies? Yes, you bet!

Liars are outed, exposed as such

But facts shift beliefs? Not Very much.

 

Alternate, synthetic, made in liars’ cortex

Primed, timed, via the communications vortex

Organic facts, no toxins, artificial ingredients

Media monopoly, real facts’ threatened existence.

 

 

            Syllables

They came home in droves

From a war they proposed

Was the war to end all wars

Heavily traumatised

Psychologically victimised

No-one, thought about the cause.

 

Shell-shock, the word

World War One first heard

Returned servicemen simply discharged

Alcoholism, suicide

Domestic violence broadside

Ignored, no help, society’s problems enlarged.

 

Then World War Two

Your country needs you

On return, only one thing changed

Same sorry game

But with a new name:

Battle fatigue, four syllables, still estranged.

 

With Korea and Vietnam

Experts: a new psalm

Now eight syllables, government response the same

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

Same mental prison warder

Lives ruined, for what? Iraq, Afgan farce, same, futile pain game.

 

 

                 Men

Make a list, of the world’s every problem

Depressing litany, our future solemn

The finger of blame, to our great shame

Is human psyche, our so-called main acclaim.

 

Discriminate further, with each tale of woe

With few exceptions, go on, prove it ain’t so

For example: Amazons (but more on that later)

It’s men, the cause, testosterone the dictator.

 

Rainforest tribes still living traditional lives

Anthropologists tell us testosterone thrives

Up to half of all men, killed by besiege

Disputes over women, possessions, prestige.

 

A proportion of men, with uncaring perpetrations

Mass shootings, DV, violent crimes, accusations

Corporate greed, religious, political oppression

Environment destruction, men’s callous obsession.

 

Corruption, wars, weapons, mass destruction

Poverty, social inequity, inequality’s fluxion

Even legal ‘justice’ meted out to women

By old-boy misogynists, wigs, not real men.

 

Men-run junk TV shows, trash mags, media, indignant

‘Expose’ scurry women, poor, uneducated, illiterate, pregnant

Slut-shaming, media morals, the fallen celebrity

Their unsupportive ‘partners,’ not scorned for their notoriety.

 

With few exceptions it’s all down to men

Plus a miniscule few women, acting just like ’em

A notable exclusion, the Amazons of old

In ancient Persia, pre-religion, we’re told.

 

A 30K army, exclusively women

Left armies of Men, in their own blood swimmin’

No sex for an Amazon, allowed until

She’d killed a man, new strength to instil.

 

Was this the reason, religion so clinically

Ruled by men, to mistreat females so cynically

To blame, to shame, to control, oppress

In addition to making, the world such a mess?

 

It’s obviously time, for the right sorts of women

To assume control, of management, not given

The basket-case problems unwanted by men

Who stuffed it initially, jumped ship, yet again!

 

There are lots of good men, nice men, decent

Most boys born that way, but it’s all too frequent

That circumstance dealt, callous or ignorant

‘Adults’ corrupt the template, brains then different.

 

 

           Ego ergo ignoranus

Tell me what I want to hear

Already primed, with what to fear

I believe that you can fix it

So I’ll ignore your lies and rhetoric.

 

I will buy your chocolate teapot

I’ll overlook that you’re a despot

I’ll not let facts get in the way

I’ll believe all you and yours say.

 

Tell me what and when to think

Saves me effort, more time to drink

And gob-off, mouth my ignorance

Suck-up to my wannabe preference.

 

Of my opinion, I’m dead-set sure

Chock-a-block full of fact-free manure

Mis-guided nationalism’s seductive lure

Worn out clichés, simplistic sewer.

 

S’pose if yer head is up yer own bum

Smells/looks the same, no enlightenments come

Opinions not evidenced, but values-based

Use facts to counter? A total energy waste.

 

 

                 World famous

Today’s choices, evil deeds

Tomorrow’s history, reputation bleeds

Persecutions, genocides, invasions and world wars

Hitler, Amin, Stalin, Pol Pot’s despised cause.

 

Imagine future hate, the scorn and derision

Our global fate, their historical position

Climate deniers, fossil fuel elites

THE biggest genocide, ecocide: lying cheats.

 

Media hacks and complicit politicians

Their families ostracised, corrupted charlatans

THE most remembered, most likely reviled

Our worst atrocity, never reconciled.

 

The planet’s dire state, proving their guilt

Climate change hell, our biome rebuilt

So seize their assets, obscene wealth?

Help the poor, dispossessed by stealth.

 

So how will you, be remembered by those

Left with the mess, the costs, indisposed

Your kids and grandkids, grossly ashamed

Guilt by association, named and blamed?

 

 

            Mamma don’t want…

Don’t need no useless bureaucrats

Ambitious sycophant fat cats

Don’t want no three-word slogans

From clueless, elected, self-serving bogans.

 

Don’t want no alternative facts

Or deliberate, deceptive acts

Don’t want no tweeting monkey

Nor misogynist right-wing flunky.

 

Don’t want no populist audition

No anti-pollie politician

Nor single-dimensional apparition

No dog-whistle deglutition.

 

‘Cos I’ve got awareness, cognition

Ability, desire, to sort fact from fiction

‘Cos humanity’s never been so lonely

Mother Earth thinks, sadly, if only…

 

 

                                                                        Readin’

To read, ostensibly, is to be well read

Not junk, celebrity, social trivia fed

Not mullet in a fish shop window, dead

You know: mouth open, gaze fixed ahead

Not stuff to con, to buy, to be misled

Emotion, compassion, not literary featherbed

But stuff with meaning, importance unsaid

Stuff worth the use of a pencil lead

That pulses the brain’s capillary bed

Sometimes it’s fiction, sometimes dread

Sometimes it’s info, or meaning instead

Gleaned from others’ insight, experience fled

Discovery, new thoughts, pursuits to embed

   Knowledge from reading, thinking’s wellhead.

 

                 Mr. Time

Time is a precious commodity

I say it’s more of an oddity

The faster we move, the more time slows

When it started, nobody knows.

 

Time’s been around, a long, long time!

Nature’s way, of importance, it’s prime

Of making sure, not everything happens

At the same time, for Homo sapiens.

 

The fourth dimension, to 3-D space

No time, no sequence, physical pace!

The gateway to future, from the past

Critical measurement of how events last.

 

English language’s most-used noun

Opposite cultures’ surprising turnaround

Their past is the future ‘cos you can see it

Don’t sweat the small stuff’s reverse split.

 

Time’s Quantum view, two particles entangled

Angular momentum, measured, the one wrangled

Point in time, matches, same time, the other speck

But not if, same time, by another’s observed check!

 

And super-determinism, Quantum’s time take on fate

Free will, accidents, luck? All Quantum mandate

The Big Bang, particles entangled, now widespread

Across the Universe, their quantum futures still wed.

 

Time can be measured with great precision

Applied to formulae, theoretical decision

Geologic, biologic, evolutionary gang

All the way back to THE big bang.

 

Time-poor Trilobites were chronologically had

Earth’s rotation, twenty-one-hour day fad

But slower orbit, four-twenty day year

Five-thirty million years ago, calendar queer.

 

Chunks of mantle sinking to the core

Momentum conserved, rotation speeds more

But the moon’s gravity, frictional forces

Shortened the year, as orbit changed courses.

 

The scarcest resource, life’s unknown allotment

Scenarios rob you, more time in lament

Increasing demands, same calendar, clock.

Priority, discretion, excuses? Tick, tock!

 

One of time’s edicts, but little known

Opportune window, chances blown

Must happen now, otherwise too late

Brain wiring, climate action, shut the gate.

 

Daily time balance, fourteen-forty minutes

10K decisions, most by subconscious limits

Changing your mind, voracious chore

So research, sleep on it, think while you snore.

 

While memory allows, re-runs of time

Nostalgia’s ineffectual handbrake on time

Fear appears to slow down time

Aging’s impression is sped up mime.

 

Timelessness exists, implicit memories do

Imprint for life, subconscious, many pre-age two

Subversive time beds itself, like a software virus

Hijacks the present, alarmed feelings, conscious.

 

Pattern-match trigger, no context, place in time

Flawed thoughts, acts, no reason nor rhyme

Time subjugates memories, buried, re-birthed

Intangible feelings: performance, relationships cursed.

 

So a Universe minus the forth dimension

No reason to plan, no future intention

No need to imagine, no cause to regret

No history’s lessons, no past to forget.

 

Time: you can’t make it, nor even store

Can’t save it, waste it, or buy more

Only one thing, with time you can do

Is spend it, once, then lost to you.

 

So how you spend it, work or play

Sad, happy, anxious castaway

People will judge, what you do

When Mr. Time, comes for you…

 

The ultimate known, known conundrum

‘There is no reality, just perception’

Which depends on fact reception

In turn determined by rejection

Of facts, as beliefs filter perception!

 

Ignorance, unknown knowns, confirmation bias

Damaged psyches, pre-set emotions and liars

Fake news, complicit media, and corruption

mis-guided values, Earth’s inevitable destruction?

 

But geosystems, nature, have no such interdiction

Just reality and its conclusive prediction

Will it sway this human affliction

In time to stay our valediction?

 

         Just wondering…

Who am I?

What makes me cry?

Where am I from?

What light have I shone?

Where have I been?

What have I seen?

What makes me sigh?

What makes me try?

What makes me me?

What will I be?

Why would I lie?

When will I die?

What makes me good

To do what I should?

What don’t I see?

What’s wrong with me?

Maybe I should Google me…

 

             Que sera, no necesita sera

The world’s near fucked

Like the oyster shucked

Gobbled with greed

No care, no heed

Packed to the rafter

With problems, less laughter

Resources near finished

Responses diminished

The one bright light

Our grandkids delight

Innocent of their plight

Deprived of their right

I ponder what age

With realised rage

The questioned wonder

At our selfish plunder.

 

                    Numero uno

Traced right back to the evolutionary trunk

On the Venn diagram of Earth’s problematic gunk

Ground zero, where all overlaps, intersects

What is the single biggest problem our demise expects?

 

Pollution, extinctions, climate catastrophe?

Wars, pestilence, societal breakdown inevitability?

Egos, greed, aggression, competition prone?

No… none of the above, it’s testosterone!

 

The walking handbag

Mirror, mirror on the wall

What you see can enthral

They say the camera never lies

A mirror gives, that which dies.

 

Darkness robs us of its sight

And angles of reflected light

Require position front and centre

Cue for narcissist to enter.

 

First an hour of makeup mix

Toners, highlights, blemish fix

Hair then clothes, accessories to match

Mirror-time more than that post latch.

 

Dinner or beach, same routine

Having the look and being seen

No hobbies, self-interests, nothing to say

Shallow and boring, lying mirror to pay.

 

Mirrors don’t enlighten, educate, know

Not knowing your arse from your elbow

And personal qualities not improved

Mirror-time spent, mental health soothed.

 

 

                    Lemmings

Pity poor lemmings, they rush at the cliff

Obligate copycats, or acting as if

Some tangible force is driving their brain

Their lives abruptly, straight down the drain.

 

But what of young people and some not so young

Who spend their time, lives digitally strung

Together by code in myriad devices

Which dissect, splice, share, in social slices.

 

It promised so much, this tech revolution

But mostly it’s wrought, convergent evolution

As minds and values are bent to a culture

Now easy targets to all kinds of vulture.

 

None the least, the dimension of time

Not being first, brings bile or chyme

Gimme gimme, I demand it be mine

To share with “friends” and get a “like” sign.

 

It’s now about status and crass popularity

Not serious issues with fact, depth and clarity

We’re thinking like lemmings, blinkered and shallow

With empathy gone, we’re blasé and callow.

 

It’s not the care factor that’s gone from our thought

It’s what’s entertaining, of vital import

The rapid procession, ephemeral “cool” frenzy

Posted to prompt, a new state of envy.

 

With work, play and posting now obviously blurred

And lives destroyed, so publicly slurred

Evil files shared and zealots recruited

The question to post: “Is society rooted?”

 

 

                  Privacy piracy’s privacy

The table’s been turned, when starting as a noun

The doer changed to adjective, done, by virtual shakedown

Doing a Google search, now other way round

Searcher now searched, filched data server bound.

 

No clear notice, nor notion of when

No idea, “Oh, it just happened then.”

They access your photos, your files, your browser

And spy with your camera, microphone, digital hand in your trouser.

 

Not just metadata, your emails, tweets, Facebook

Monitored, your location, GPS, they know where to look

Any device, when it’s on, is belching your privacy

To whom, who knows, the irony is, it’s all done privately!

 

Zuckerberg spruiks, “Privacy: an outdated social norm.”

While making billions, selling your privacy corm

And going to great lengths to protect his own privacy

Thieving hypoclite (polite ‘c’ word) his money buys primacy.

 

And criminal intrusion, worms, bots, data miners, loggers

Binary ‘residents’ betray your files, theft cataloguers

Password access, intellectual capital, pilfered undetected

Like hackers, steal, copy, counterfeit, publish, all unsuspected.

 

While Wikileaks breaks secrets for public good

And Twitter, Facebook out stories that otherwise would

Like Bitcoin, Blockchain encryption, avoid public domain

Is privacy’s loss anonymity’s gain?

 

 

            Feminequity

If the suffragettes ignited the flame of feminism

Then seventies ‘women’s lib’ surely busted conservatism

And fan-forced the fires of deserved desire

But it’s time to take stock, its success, to inquire.

 

Some women: men-hating zealots, others reject the cause

Others ambivalent. Commentary, like all other popularity wars

Is missing the point: it’s not about contested tribalism

It’s about progress, on fairness, equity, and, equality’s triumphalism.

 

Much success, hard-won, to celebrate, despite hordes of MAMs

And MAFs (male-allied females), traitors, insecure perfumed hams

But only in select nations, regions, demographics, households

The great majority denied the fire’s warmth, never any footholds.

 

Do feminazis do the cause more harm than good?

Polarising, alienating FAMs who otherwise would

Empathize, sympathize, celebrate, support their gigs

While emboldening the misogynist ignorant pigs.

 

Have the fruits of feminism, the success thus far

Subverted the progress, the door now more than ajar?

The cause célèbre, a cofactor in its own demise

Now near yet so far, less advance from any reprise?

 

So has feminism flat-lined, reached its use-by date?

What reasons, alternatives? Much to contemplate.

How much perceived ‘success’ is the product of elitist girls schools

While the majority languish, unfunded, unrealised talent pools?

 

Does a wealthy female CEO with status, afforded style

Have any more empathy, altruism, supportive guile

Than their equally narcissistic, self-promoting equivalent male?

Or is it, ‘I’m alright, make your own way, without my privileged trail.’

 

The sisterhood has much to endure, much to greatly admire

But increasing numbers deny the hood, or act the coy fake trier

Or worse, seek to curse, those who for the cause do great good

Wannabe elites who spurned Gillard, deserve contempt of the sisterhood.

 

Does the groupthink, covert bullying by exclusion in elitist girls’ schools

The increase in opportunism, populism, exploiting aspects of feminism’s tools

The increasing narcissists, sociopaths, social media swarms, and control freaks

Trumpism, power by women over women, cause feminism’s deflating leaks?

 

Are the high-achieving, driven products of selective schools

The demanding, competitive protegees of tiger mum rules

Aware, empathetic to most girls’ unfair realities

Or self-imposed actuaries, sympathetic amputees?

 

Is being right-wing synonymous with MAFs?

Do right-wing parents stifle, deny girls being FAFs?

Does privilege emotionally immunize women?

Or elite company, position, intimidate, keep hidden?

 

What do these women, with position, power to influence

Do for poor girls, urban, remote, to promote their affluence

The silent majority, trapped by patriarchal inequity

Feminequity, the new flame, to help forge equality?

 

Standards? Make mine a double!

Fat-bottomed girls, what about fat-arsed blokes?

Truckloads of ‘ em, not the butt of constant jokes

She’s old and wrinkly, no-one wants to see

But bald, fugly, triple-chinned ties: “Hey, listen to me!”

 

Women’s imperative, biological, get the best genes you can

His money, position, your kids’ best chance, the plan

While blokes’ unconscious aim, to the next generation

Donate the most genes, attracts mild acclamation.

 

And women assumed available, the default setting

Fair game for innuendo, advances, unwanted petting

Policing unlawful, men’s sexual behaviour

Rejection earns punitive boys’ club disfavour.

 

The pressure on women, demands youthful looks

Unending scrutiny, scoops revealed, TV, magazines, books

Splash their failings, limitations, marginal success

Of extreme diet, surgery, botox, detox, clothes in excess.

 

A good-looking woman can be pretentious, bitchy, vacuous

But perceived as ‘with it,’ nice, even miraculous

Whereas nice, courageous, decent, talented ‘chooks’

Dismissed, lampooned, ‘cos of inherited looks.

 

And second-rate blokes, with delusions of adequacy

Bumble on, unchallenged, paid well with permanency

Body, face, personality, all unattractive, repugnant?

No hint, no question of being made redundant.

 

The bit

From semaphore flags, to mail in bags, by ship, coach and pack horse

And aldis lamp morse, wire, radio mode, now, completely of course

Replaced by digital micro-lectronics, 4G phone, and fast fibre optic

Comms are instant, personal, mass-market, even slightly hypnotic.

 

So much media, info-dense, constantly bombarding senses

Brains astute, alert but swamped, causing lowered defences

And ignorance, confirmation bias, dead-easy to outwit

Cos dishonest, duplicitous frauds with trickery, deliberately leave out the BIT.

 

And priests preached in Latin, knew no-one could speak it

Cos fear brings power, subservience, their “teachings” all but shit

For centuries of wealth, wars, persecution, they’ve gotten away with it

By cunning design, deliberate denial, cover-ups they’ve left out the BIT.

 

When it comes to selling, ads compelling, us to part with our cash

Photoshopped image, pseudoscience gimmicks, celebs, testimonials bash

Our sensory environment, mandate requirement, convert our needs to “want it”

Glib advertorials, ads dressed as news, but all still minus the BIT.

 

No interest declared, no fee paid disclosed, nor lobbied secret pacts

Rumour, amplified, codified, conscious uncoupled substantive facts

The addition/subtraction of selective data, a fallacious narrative to fit

Whoever, whatever, whenever, a lie, to leave out the salient BIT.

Two black crows

 

Two black crows sitting on a wire

One named Henry, the other Josiah

Hot to the touch this thin new perch

Strung between poles, metal, not birch

Erected by white men, what can it mean?

Nothing like black men, for centuries seen

Mouths spout white spray, on finger-spread hands

Pressed against rocks, once which were sands.

 

“Aark! Aark, Aark!” The crow’s melancholy lament

Or so it seems, to the human ear rent

With this sound so stark, but with obvious nuance

What can it mean; is it scold, scorn or romance?

Perhaps a rendition, with confidence spent

In a landscape unchanged, and familiar scent

Of a past, present, future with sameness and surety

Life would be dull, with no humans for scrutiny.

 

Two black crows sitting on a wire

Wings defy gravity,  perched up higher

Heads cocked lop-sided and fixed glance askew

Humans to ponder, strange marks on paper, pencils do

They enter the building, where staccato clicks

From morse key and reader, whose aim is to fix.

The tyranny of distance and lonely of heart

The rest of the white world, of which they are part.

 

But the crows have no notion, that pulsed electricity

Conveys under-foot, invisibly, such succinct explicity

And be as they may, words of hope and  importance

Of love, ambition and the cold world of finance

They betray no warnings of grave  circumstance

That there is with nature, no second chance

The foreboding future, dulled by curiosity

The culling of nature, with no reciprocity.

 

Two black crows sitting on a wire

Parallel to it, an identical sire

Whose purpose as  metal pair, enables voice

To race at speed, at time, place of choice

Its senders not sighted, in rambling sheds, houses

Seen for miles, no trees, just fields, farmers, spouses

And kids, playing here, there, pitch lethal stones

With shanghais, knock crows, off wiry thin thrones.

 

Two black crows sitting anywhere but on wire

Not by choice, nor lack of desire

But simple, obvious absence, abundantly matched

By fields supplanted, spanned roofs, tiled not thatched

From which emanates the silent fog of radio waves

Whose importance dictates how everyone behaves

Even the crows, now nothing to fear, humans seldom seen

In cooled comfort, with internet and TV, talking has been

Removed from the wire, replaced, by magnetic quick fog

White noise not heard, even by, the barking “guard” dog.

 

But real noise there is in the early morn

When the new dawn’s peace is suddenly torn:

“Aark! Aark, Aark!” provokes angry retort

“Get outta here, let me sleep, as my head is fraught

With hangover and headache, and besides it’s Sunday

A day of sleep-ins, and preparedness for Monday!”

But the call of the crows is no malicious plot

It’s a cry of despair for the ignorant human lot.

 

“Look at the damage in your new way of life

Is the greed worth the stress, disconnect and strife?

What of the future, no land of milk and honey

Will white men realise, you can’t eat money?”

But humans ignore, the calls with apathy

Or reply with scorn, born of psychopathy

“We must sustain growth and strength of economy!”

Sadly for all, it’s not the right homily.

 

Two black crows sitting on abandoned wire

Discussing the loss, of once was shire

Up high no longer but safe on old fence

Humans have gone, no longer hence

History repeating, another civilisation lost

Humans don’t learn, that it’s nature’s cost.