In Praise Of Quietude

The vanity of vanity
is not just that so much of the speech
vanity inspires expands indefinitely
to change nothing, it also denies
how the most effective changes
come though quiet contemplation. 

Futile Potential

We all retreat from being thought of
as human cul-de-sacs by others.
That is the less obvious side
of human consciousness at work.

But how much does that retreat
ensure that our being known,
whether freely or with conditions,
is the surest route to us unknowingly
becoming a dead end for other people?

The Truest Charity Comes From A Felled Tree

As a voluntary worker I find that I exist
to support the part time civil servants
in my local council ,whose job-amongst others-
is to hand out forms devised far away
by civil servants employed full time
and who have well cushioned pensions
founded on the number of trees felled
for paper pulp to devise forms for grants
for the voluntary sector to apply for.
It is as if the grants were a reverse
Noblese Oblige for the unpaid, a role
that those cushion themselves now
and  in old age could never take up
for themselves. The civil service required
to create the forms for them to complete
and perform to would cost way too much....