Underworld

 

 

     Life here, life now,

be akin to a forced air environment,

   the day pans out as before and,

      the tickly cough and sore throat;-

            a common denominator in our being.

 

     Before all the labels were created

for observance of all and fully kept,

   we had choice of being – besides

   the submariner we now are,

      there was no world to aspire to as,

          we were living and living upon

                  freedoms that had no reference to wallet.

 

          ‘all those labels are now null and void before

                a time travelling beast - to upset destiny,

                        all are compromised and know it too!’

 

       Are you now the norms and values

of a dictating slut?

           Am I too with wit and fantasy,

                pain and sorrow, children and

                       wife I cannot see, sense or hear?

 

     There are now a multitude of check boxes

  that require your attention,

       make sure your pen has the ink to

           mark a tick at every prompt that isn’t you,

               and your pension will be your reward

                       that death denies three months before.

 

     ‘Mike Ladd’ has a poem that references

‘worlds to emerge from’ but in here, and in ‘now,’

   we no longer know of the world we are told of,

      our forced air environment has every

     notion we exist – remove ‘awareness’ of being.

 

     One day, before death,

 our conscience may behold an idea

    that there is a world to emerge ‘to,’

        but does our submariner still know,

              how to breathe real air?

 

                      'My throat is sore, so too my heart, my soul!'

 

 

 

Michael J Waite 2nd April 2025.