The Shape Of Things To Come

Bit of dystopian nightmare for a Monday morning.

The Shape Of Things To Come

It seems they’ve come to an agreement

On climate change, global warming and such

That will assure the future of planet Earth

Give the human species new birth

Signed a new treaty, whatever that’s worth

To avoid a dystopian future of gloom, steer us away from impending doom

Give our atmosphere a little more room, and let us breathe once again

So does that mean we’ve found a solution?  That there’ll no longer be any pollution?

Can we stop worrying and relax?  I don’t think so, and here are some facts:

It’s like a resolution to cut down on smoking, not to stop, but to carry on choking,

Just a little more slowly – and I’m not joking

The planet’s future is probably nixed, because the problems aren’t fully fixed

It’s just a huge box of tricks

The carbon’s still being dug out of the ground, and will continue to be burned all around

Science and technology collude in the cracking, to assist industries like mining and fracking

Extracting resources sadly lacking, so into the corner we’re backing

Destroying what’s left of the thin atmosphere, undermining the whole biosphere

You see - the damage is already done!  The Jet-stream’s decidedly swung

Into a different pattern and course

Global population’s increasing perforce

Which means we’re heading no doubt, towards malnutrition, starvation and drought

Poverty and desperation all about

Rising temperatures and rising seas, natural systems brought to their knees

Typhoons and hurricanes, monsoon rains, dust-storms across all terrains

Freak hailstorms, weird weather in all of its forms

Choking fog, carcinogenic smog

Gas-masks and particulates you can taste

And then in our haste, we’re tipping out waste

Into the oceans that boil, there’s not much left to spoil

It’s quite drastic, the sheer amount of plastic - it’s simply fantastic

It seems there’s no escape, from the rape of the landscape

As we hollow out the planet, exhaust our reserves,

Taint the water courses, use up the resources

Till there’s so few, that there’s nothing to do, and none left to renew

With intensive methods of factory farming, the over-crowding’s alarming

And processes even less charming

We can’t afford a reduction, in the scale of food production

With gene-splicing and genetic modification’s persistence

Creating anti-biotic and painkiller resistance

In a move that’s endemic, the threat of a global pandemic

Spawning mutations, hybrids and clones, as well as pumping in buckets of hormones

Poisoning that goes down to the bones – and now the skies are filled up with drones

As the global corporations push for power - they’re a dangerous, de-regulated shower

Where corruption’s a too-common flower

The free-market economy believers, elitist capitalist system deceivers

People in pursuit of gain, never mind the pain

Never hear the under-privileged sobbing

Or the self-determination it’s robbing

Leaving the stark choice of unemployment , or insecure underpaid jobs

How are the under-pensioned to fare, in a system of under-resourced care?

The elderly, the vulnerable, the poor?  The sick and the weak are left on the floor!

Whilst the rich climb into their gilded towers, protected by private security powers

With their robots, and servants and slaves, the rest of us head for our shelters and caves

Barricaded inside our modules or heading for our early graves

But that’s how market forces work in the end, and polarisation of life-chances tend

To foster political and religious extremism that bend right-wing fundamentalism to rend

The world to its liking

And as the suicide bombers, move deftly among us

As their explosions we hear, coming increasingly near

Creating a stewing mass of violence and fear

Nowhere is safe, it can be presumed

Conclusion – I think we’re all doomed!

 Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2017