Inflation, I tell you.

Back in my day, happiness was a stuffed bear,
Or finishing an ice cream before it melted down your arm.

And you came back with change.

Now it takes a life loan, entire people involved.
Might as well cost a first-born.

I hear they make it over-seas now, for pennies a day,
But I'm sure not paying any less for it.

Maybe if they subsidised it, like a good government,
I could afford three square smiles a day.

Hell, one would be nice.

I'll just have to work a second job
To afford being able to afford things.

That **** inflation,
Always driving up the price.

the foxgloves explode
in infinite slow motion [silently]

from them also we can learn
the soft crash and save ourselves

from the genius suicide:
the brief fame of a supernova

…

intermittent rain keeps the land fecund,
a deluge cleanses to the bedrock,
rain in perpetuity is impossible
and we think we can control this

but we live at one speed,
and measure in standard units:
our language is insufficient
to give a precise reflection

…

to assume our laws are true beyond appeal
puts into question our democratic process

we forget the necessity of conversation
the original Greek ideal of the agora;

to meet friends and argue is the point, is it not, of life,
of all this noise, after all, what use is silence?

…

our luxury of having the exercise of our conscience
is subsidised by the suffering of a multitude other

..and yet

when we all speak with one
language / currency / voice
there is no poetry anymore
no rhyme, no metre, no form

in this Heaven only, [on Earth], we are united

Silence. Solvent. Substituted;
subsidised
then marginalised
instituted and muted.
And, often
persecuted.

Rationanalised
by abstraction:
every minuscule
interaction dissected.
All that is left is convoluted,
misconstrued
and rejected.

The lucid bewildered.
The disillusioned bejeweled:
rooted in their state of mind.

Effortlessly self-proclaiming
restraining
and refraining
purging the imagination:
the waning of maligned mankind.

And all of his
illuminated limitations.

As the daily news  I was reading,
Here is the story that was leading,
Zombie spider slaves, wasp masters dictating,
Subsidised fake spider skills,
Wasp masters must be getting their thrills,
I sense an allegory,
Like humanity's history,
Teeming ants in a global rat race,
Pleasing some master's lack of grace.
Same scenario, different day,
Till you retire and fade away,
Who, indeed, are our wasp masters?
Come on, humans, work much faster,
Don't you forget to hurry,
Or wasp masters shall give you curry!

As the daily news  I was reading,
Is there no other news for leading?
Yes, allegory I was perceiving.

In the city that never sleeps
Nobody has time to dream

No one cares for the color scheme
Everybody on these streets are mean
Women over here dress to ****

Yearning for a life to steal
Outrageous trigger happy police
Ruthless, spiteful and rigorous
Kindness comes fatally priced

No time for love or paradise  
Obsessive depression is what's subsidised
Beggars on my train struggle and scuffle
Oblivious oppression lurking
Delirious children deceived  
Yesterday's conception grieved

Craving lust is a must
Ageless shame is  
Rationalized pain
Everyone here idealizes blame
S*erenity is an absentee in this chaotic city

I looked the other way but saw you coming
I heavily subsidised you and acted on impulse but I saw you coming.
Like a leach unable to find it's own food source I saw you coming but let you take a sip before you could bleed me dry.
You ducked and you dived but I saw you coming.
No fancy footwork though, you tried to bulldoze your way by acting out a false reputation.
No one works for someone who barks. That's your style. A riddle makes more sense than you do.
I saw you coming.
You're a sugar loaf!
I'm golden syrup!
I saw you coming!
Seeing is avoiding!

We watch our mobiles and our tellies,
TV on the internet,
Internet on the TV,
On the mobile.

Our lives are spent
Immersed in soaps
And reality TV.
Hours and hours
Of subsidised sport
And fake news.

Daily quizzes
And Jeremy Kyle
To keep us occupied
And Boredom at bay.

Like zombies we stare at our mobiles
Almost colliding
With people on the street.
Oh yes we chat
And message and text
With folk we’ve never met
Presuming they are real.

We play out time,
Betting and scheming:
Fantasy Leagues
And Facebook,
Snapchat and God knows what.

Occupying our addictive minds
Until the Grim Reaper comes.
“Comfortably numb” until the end.

Paul Butters

8\9\2018.

i am just a shadow in the dream of a ghost
of these flows of light that are lost on you
like so many endless turning maelstroms
at a molecular level, i too
not noticing through all the commotion
i am in the orbit of a black sun.
your woman, your woman does not exist.
a man is made of insecurity
and all the history of violence.
the symbolic universe is not
big enough for freedom. it will not be
expanded by words: detention centres
must collapse – yarl’s wood, its whole idea, a start
to end systematic sub-contracted
sexist racist subsidised violence.

and man should rather perish than take and steer
and twice rather perish than make himself
hated and feared. he said from on high
paraphrasing a misogynist.
britain: two women a week are murdered
at home, by a partner or ex-partner;
one third turned from refuge for lack of space;
austerity closes thirty-two refuges
and counting.

It’s that moment when I’m two beers in
It numbs me enough not to notice my pain
But not enough to numb my feelings
It’s the closets thing I have to peace

The problem is the feeling can’t be sustained
No more beers and the feeling wears off and the reality comes back
Another beer in, and I loose touch with reality

If I was granted one wish
It would be to capture that moment when you lay on a couch and think of nothing
Just relax
To have a shower and feel the day wash off you
I haven’t had the day wash off feeling in over 6 months
Can you imagine that
The same day troubles on top of the same day troubles
No reset

I can’t imagine a future so I don’t
I can’t imagine tomorrow  so I don’t
I can’t vision being happy so I don’t

There is no way of living for me rather than one second at a time
And sometimes I just don’t want to live in that second, so I don’t
I die
In someway I die

There seems to be more dying moments than living ones of late

I try to distract my self by keeping busy
Look for new job
Buy a motorbike
Play tennis after work
Climb after work
Footy after work
Swim after work

I’m so ******* exhausted
It’s all so exhausting
But at least than I sleep
Unless I have a nightmare
That wakes me up
Heart beating so fast
Anxiety!
Anxiety!

I can’t wait to get home and drink two beers
Bring me back to that level again
So fleeting
So unstable
Tired
Sad
Exhausted

I wish the government would subsidised my smoking and drinking costs
Put it down as mental health care

I’m finding it hard to express myself

I need help
But I’m told I have to help myself
I guess I wish I was still just a kid
I guess I wish I never lost my innocence
I guess I wish I never lost my mum

I’m scared of when smoking doesn’t work anymore
Then what do I do

When did this get all so complicated
How did this get all so messed up?

..and now that we're subsidised by the state
it doesn't matter about being
late
we're no longer working nine to five
I am just trying
to stay alive.

But
enough rope is enough for the hanging
and I ain't hanging around for that,

and that, is the flat rate of income tax soaring,

this decade will become known as the roaring
twenties,
I can already hear the roaring of the female worker as the twenty pound notes in her wages desert her
and the men?
well
they'll be in the **** again.

we're done for
doomed
the workhouse looms

Marshalsea advertises rooms in the Metro
compact and bijou
for a touch of the retro
and
we're done for.