TALKING COMPASSION DEFICIENCY BLUES

it's me again
been a while, crocodile
no particular excuses, man
just busy as ever at the great steel n glass birdcage
sometimes this cyber thing can get a bit lonely
when the comments run dry
IS THERE ANYBODY OUT THERE????
sitting on an e-cloud?
floating out there on the e-ther?
must give up on these internet puns
they're truly awful...
walked out of the steel n glass birdcage this afternoon
bright sunny seoul pavement
heat bouncing up from the concrete beneath my feet
walked past a 'save the children' stall
those photos hit me hard in the stomach
wham!!!!!!!
pictures of little kids
covered in bruises and scars and cigarette burns
who could do such a thing?
(you could do such a thing
i could do such a thing
we’re all human, friends)
couldn’t help but start making CONNECTIONS...
where do i start?
let's make it within my parents lifetimes:
two whole cities incinerated in japan
dresden reduced to ashes
untold numbers with birth defects in vietnam
(wow! that's MY lifetime!)
hundreds of thousands killed...traumatised in iraq
collateral damage?
a price worth paying?
i dont think so
VIOLENCE!!!!
yobs in the street
racist thugs
refugees go home
youre nickin our f***ing jobs
take that you gypo scum!
bamm!!
VIOLENCE!!!!
train our kids to be meat-eaters
put down your cute little teddy friend
come to the table
eat up that brown lump on the plate
executed in a stinking abbatoir
stuck in a freezer
plucked from a clingfilm-wrapped Styrofoam supermarket tray
thrown in a frying pan
served up for dinner
kind of know where it came from
but don’t really wanna think too much about that
ain't got no qualms about those factory farms
with their inconvenient tales to tell:
the agonised cries of the perma-pregnant cows
the squalid squeals of the pitiful pigs
social animals
jammed so heartlessly into their concrete torture cells
the little male chicks
cast into the incinerator seconds after birth
eat up your peas, love
VIOLENCE!!!!
the rat race
survival of the fittest
stepping on others to get that promotion
sneer at those who look out for others
look out for number one, mate!
don’t worry about the casualties
who aren’t so clever
who aren’t so able
who get fired
who lose their income
who can't feed their families
who lose their dignity
who hit the bottle
who hit their wives, girlfriends
and little kids
who end up with broken arms
and cigarette burns
and bruises
black and blue from head to toe
why is it that we don’t see the connection
between VIOLENCE and VIOLENCE????
between tory blair n george w and that thug who just smacked you in the head
there’s only one way out
gotta reject this apologetic shit
gotta cultivate compassion
gotta cultivate the urge to take action to relieve the suffering of others
thats me done for today
over and out
sorry for the rant
see ya
f
xxxx