In this world newfangled
the roots of inequality
run deep, twisted, tangled
enmeshed in frivolity
Kept the hope of the poor stifled
while by the powerful rifled
Not Poetry. Quatrain Verse in English & Swedish. Dagsverser. On the Mundane & the Arcane.
In this world newfangled
the roots of inequality
run deep, twisted, tangled
enmeshed in frivolity
Kept the hope of the poor stifled
while by the powerful rifled
Q: “Why are you not putting on a mask?”
A: “I’m not culpable for your health
I’m self-reliant, so do not ask
also won’t be blamed for my wealth!”
If this is how some of us are
how did we stray so deep & far?
Q: “Still thinking we’re better than this?”
A: “We’re no effete Swedes or feeble French
so, World, come give U.S. a kiss!”
(albeit amidst conceited stench)
Thus we keep up the narrative:
Pretending to empathize
high-handed & declarative
averting our empty eyes
Masklessness leaves the Covid threat cowardly vague
while masked have we not faced that we’re all in a plague?
‘Leaders’ now talk about the Covid-19 struggle as ‘war’. If so – a long overdue change from the gruesome practice throughout history of sending the very young out to fight & die. Fairer now when the old folks at home become the casualties. Still what remains the outrage is how ‘essential’ workers (many poorly paid with few benefits & poorly protected) are sent out to work & die.
In most wars the young
were sent out to perish
most often unsung
or cheered with praise garish
The old folks at home jingoistic
of soldiers horrors euphemistic
Now in the Covid ‘war’
with its surreptitious gore
Lady Justice keeps score
shredding such mythical lore
Now the young live for another day
while the old folks keep dying away
Gained quite the stage presence
that Virus wily & vile
Might its omnipresence
the Power Elite beguile
as trade-off to crisis protracted
when our attention got distracted?
Stole away our concentration
on workplace exploitations
on our climate abdication
on cruel deportations
Elbowed out our awareness
of corporate giveaways
societal unfairness
injustice in too many ways
Rarely been better times
for scamming & high crimes
Whether of faith or agnostic
we flounder in Expiring Empire
Of human collapse prognostic
sped on by greed, covid & gunfire
Those propagandized still exude
a world outlook simplistic
Frantically they self delude
pious, proto-fascistic
and for all they claim to have the Godly answers
aren’t they a bunch of round-the-Golden-Calf dancers?
Blown in Twitter storm
amidst benign bloopers
howling locust swarm
of goosestep storm troopers
Under guise of virus relief
they’re bent on making the sky darken
up to their usual mischief
hoping we’re too busy to harken
The Power Elite doesn’t work for our protection
nevertheless we whimper in genuflection
Shrewd, be he not adroit
integrity abysmal
he knows how to exploit
deadlocks dreadfully dismal
He barges in by blaming
foul, rudely aggressive
insulting & inflaming
A loudmouth oppressive
How splendidly the President mirrors
his base of exceptionalist sneerers!
Since the Romans has echoed the jingoistic cry ‘Dulce et Decorum est Pro Patria Mori’ or ‘It is sweet and right to die for one’s country’:
Awash in gushing
about what’s ‘sweet & right’
while not much blushing
of others’ dead end plight
While some ‘laid down’ their lives
at home Jingoists grandstand
keep slapping their high-fives
while just The Dead know first-hand
But why bother taking time to reflect
when easier just accept or reject?
How hastily they faded
the 1920s jaded!
Now roar the 2020s
optimism restoring
but in unequal plenties
with AI faith soaring
But hurricanes rage, forests burn down
with neo-Fascism on the rise
civil & economic breakdown
in cruelly volatile guise
Now misruled by kakistocracy
brought us humiliating lows
mired in horrific hypocrisy
to suffer unknowable throes
Anytime soon now The Free Fall
which we won’t be able forestall
+)
1920’s = the ‘roaring twenties’ with its boundless optimism about the future
For a while and of late
harsh hair-triggered spates
of such deep-seated hate
spews out of the gates
Lashing out unseemly
in rancor, anger
Haranguing extremely
in cocky clangor
As each ‘elite’ just knows they know best
no need listen to the smarter rest?