Ultra processed emotions

 

I am tired and worn out,

Things are out of control,

Ultra processed emotions

Are polluting my soul.

 

Instant reactions appear on the screen,

Appealing shiny images

As sweet as can be.

Wars that kill cleanly

Never wound, madden or maim.

Reliable things and characters

That never ever age

Fresh juicy fruit, straight off the tree

Always appetising,

In the pictures that I see.

I know when I see it,

That I’m being sold a lie

Because that’s not all I eat

In my mainstream media pie.

 

I know when I see it,

That I’m being sold a lie

My reason tells me so,

But even though I try,

Images spark urges

Which I want to satisfy,

And reality can’t match

The barrage of stuff

That I see, hear and watch,

Including the illusion

That I have control.

Ultra processed emotions

Leave a hole in my soul.

IMBOLC AGAIN

A second month begins,

And as seconds slip away

Night begins to merge

From grey to paler grey.

Sounds change

As the city starts to wake.

Senses know this

Before conscious minds can,

And inside cocoons of.

Blankets, duvets and sheets

Larvae stir.

Flesh maggots emerge,

Then crawl to bathrooms.

Shedding skins of cloth,

That have inane words

Written on them.

Once washed,

Maggots metamorphose

Into people dressed in clothes

Now emblazoned with

Equally inane,

But slightly different slogans.

 

Look out and see,

Through the kitchen window,

A squadron of cormorants

Flying in a perfect v

Commuting across the city

Like everyone else

To exchange

Energy for food

To make more energy again

A second month begins.

 

 

 

OUR BLADDERS ALONE

 King Charles and my prostrate gland

Have made me into a republican man,

For whilst I groan and strain to piss,

Stuck on sixty-week waiting list,

That monarch, who I won’t call mine,

Is operated on and can recline,

In a warm clean private hospital bed,

Attentively nursed and very well fed,

Whilst I wait micturation, incomplete

On a cold suburban toilet seat.