The Blind Ventriloquist

speaks with a certain voice,
not moving his lips
whilst his dummy does the opposite,
telling an unfunny old joke
about connection and detachment.

The audience fall about for laughing,
blind to how the joke is about them.

Making others laugh
at how they manipulate others,
not recognising themselves,
is the performers best revenge.

He who sees the least
recognises most clearly
how little anything changes.

Life On Planet B

I understand how climate change deniers
and those who believe that we need to do less,
or nothing, to rescue the planet actually think.

To paraphrase Woody Allen on death,

'I'm not afraid of the planet being saved;
I just don't want to be there when it happens.'

as if they had a choice
of life on another planet
when they haven't.

The Recipe For Life

is to expect less from it, for it to seem longer. 

The 'Wrong' Deterrent

In these days of 'populist politics'
it is easy for the public to be persuaded
that a strong deterrent stops a crime
therefore the risk of an error in justice
is worth the deterrence of a strong sentence.

But wait, when I was in school
I remember when boys did wrong
and knew what they were doing,
and denied it to the very last.

Even when they were one of whole class
detained until the teacher was satisfied
that for all the outright denial of the class
the culprit was still well punished.

I do hope class detention for doing wrong
when most of us had done nothing, 
and those who did it could deny it,
was never meant to be
our first lesson in democracy. 

Innocence Is Over-Rated

When I hear adults praise the idea
of young people knowing much less
about sex than they are expected to,
I hear a delight in ignorance
that cannot be sustained.

I hear a delight in something
theoretically not existing
for it not being discussed
where everyone holds back,
for knowing uncomfortable facts
that they are barred from mentioning.

Out of sight never meant out of mind.
The promotion of asexuality or virginity
outside of marriage merely assists
the predatory male instinct
that makes marriage the excuse
for secretive and serial adulteries
which it would be better to expose.

Wiser Later, When It No Longer Matters

One of the consequences of ageing
is that you eventually become older
that the politicians who rule the media
with the youthful middle aged looks,
the promises made to the middle classes.

You know their political baby teeth will fall out
when they lose their first lost vote in Parliament.

Then the media that once praised them
as the unofficial, but working, opposition
calls them hypocrites, outright,
as if the idea was new
and becoming that way
was previously unthinkable.

After that comes the first open split
within the cabinet and the ruling party
and as the memory of the old promises
fades like old newsprint,
their renewal begins again,
from yet another set of liars.

The Power Of Music

“Music… will help dissolve your perplexities and purify your character
and your sensibilities, and in the times of care and sorrow,
it will keep a fountain of joy alive in you.”-Dietrich Bonnhoeffer  (1906-45).
  He would have lived much longer had he not been arrested
and imprisoned in 1943, and then accused of being part of
 the twenty fifth and last attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler,
in the major plot of the 20th July 1944, in which the Nazi
government also believed that The Pope had a role.

But here is to the power of music to sustain us
when little else seems to.