farming

Just Deserts

Travelling through deserts

Filled with lifelessness –

Devoid of anything,

Even pity.

All that moves

Is the enemy

To be eradicated

With alacrity

Big or small

Feather or fin

There’s no room at the inn.

Hedge and pond

Bush and tree

Ripped out

In monocultural crime

Megafauna,

Microfauna,

Weed and seed,

All past their prime.

Opher 12.9.2016

Just Deserts

I was travelling back from London on the train, belting past field after field of stubble. The harvest was in.

The only things moving were the odd crows and pigeons.

This was England. Where once used to stretch unbroken, dense forest, rustling to the sounds of insects, trilling to bird call, and providing food for deer, wild boar, bear and wolf, there is now a monocultural desert.

We have systematically cleared the forest to farm the land. The indigenous animals were cleared with it. We left tiny oasis of wasteland, woods, hedges and ponds in which the remnants of the rich fauna hung on – rabbits, hare, hedgehogs, newts, lizards, slow-worm, grass snake, dormouse and linnet.

Now they are being cleared. The modern farm equipment has no use for hedge or pond – the bigger the field the better.

Anything that dares to intrude into the desert we create is eliminated with pesticide, herbicide and machine. We don’t need them. They get their just desserts.