Black Friday and Consumerism

Posted on by Opher

Selling the planet for a handful of trinkets!!

Poetry – We’ve Finally Made It!!

Posted on by Opher

We’ve Finally Made It!!

We’ve made it!

The concrete and plastic

Have created a paradise!

We have everything we want!

We’ve got it made!

Drowning in goods;

More than we can ever need

At a price we can afford!

We’ve made the grade!

Stacking shelves

Delivering goods and serving coffee!

On a wage we can barely survive.

Opher 24.7.2019

Well as Roy Harper once said ‘the eyes that are guiding society’s ludicrous aim’. Those eyes are the wealthy who wish to sell us their products, who exploit our labour, cut down trees, clear forests and are creating a plastic hell-hole.

I hope we’ll all be happy there in our sterile loneliness.

I think we are in great danger of forgetting all the things that really count – the love of friendship, love, nature and the beauty of the natural world.

Poetry – An Invisible Machine

Posted on by Opher

An Invisible Machine

There is an invisible machine

Relentlessly churning around the world.

Into its maw goes forests, lakes

And whole oceans.

Out of its rear

It excretes plastic trinkets

And control.

Its gears drip with blood and sap.

Sitting astride this behemoth,

This slow-motion holocaust,

The gleeful sneering drivers spray champagne down upon us.

In its wake the controlled

Buy trinkets and are distracted

By the addictive effluent

As they desperately strive to climb on board.

Their dream

Is that they too might live to spray champagne.

When its job is done

And all the wonders have been transformed to junk

It will consume itself.

Opher 18.9.2016

An Invisible Machine

I wrote this poem on the way back from a Roy Harper gig in Scotland. We discussed the environmental damage being wreaked upon the world by the selfish, greedy minority who control the capitalist machine that is destroying the planet.

Five billion people live in poverty and despair while a few hundred thousand squander everything in a senseless orgy of extravagance.

The forests, lakes and seas are being consumed. The chimps, elephants and rhinos machine-gunned.

I suggested Roy wrote an epic song on this subject. He told me that he was writing one about what goes on in people’s minds. That is where the madness is conceived!

As we are distracted with booze, sex and TV, religion, psuedodemocracy and talent shows, tribute bands, muzac  and nostalgia, fashion, glamour and celebrity, the real world is being ripped apart before our very eyes!!!

Poetry – New Eden

Posted on by Opher

New Eden

While sandcastle civilisations wait for the rushing tide

Welcome to New Eden where we’ll keep you satisfied

We can shape your imperfect body and soothe your troubled mind

Sanitise your lifestyle and make your stress unwind

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

You’re a chosen stakeholder in our glittering merchandise

Buy your way to freedom where ‘don’t think’ will suffice

Never ask the questions except to scheme for more

Satisfy your hungers in New Eden’s superstore

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

Never count the costs when your credit is on tap

Earn and spend forever with a knick-knack in every gap

If you want to see a tree we’ve plenty in the museum

The entrance fee is very small and you don’t queue long to see them

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

Last season’s fashion? Just throw it in the bin

Make space for the new styles screaming to get in

Nothings built to last in this throwaway society

Don’t glance sideways through the windscreen while you’re so hale and hearty

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

I hope that you like concrete, tarmac and glass

We can get you anywhere, comfortable, safe and fast

Get it down you, bring it up, you know it does you good

You never have to question who directs the neighbourhood

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

The fun has just begun

Opher 19.2.01

Aaah – the future beckons. We will all be consumer units in the concrete and glass enclave, our every need catered for, our every thought directed – something for every whim and every whim induced.

We shall be happy and satisfied as we sip our medicine and go where directed to sample what is provided for our delectation.

Our world will be fully sanitised and safe. All will be provided. We won’t even have to think.