Eulogy to a Moth

We found it dead in our daughter's bed

It was light as a feather

And we wondered whether there were any words

To say, with which to pay our respects

To this creature, on that would barely feature

In our day to day lives

One which only ever arrives

With the sun down, light switched on

A true fly by night on paper wings

This airborne goth

Sleep well, little moth

Christmas Dreams and Fears

Do you dream of bright wrapped boxes
Full of expensive gifts?
Or do you fear your kids going without
If you don't get those extra shifts?

Do you dream of that after dinner feeling
Contented and well fed?
Or do you fear for another Christmas
Without a roof over your head?

Do you dream of seeing the family
How your nephews have all grown?
Or do you fear that your help won't come
Elderly and all alone?

Do you dream of falling snow
A blanket cold and white?
Or do you fear for rising seas
A world ready to ignite?

Do you dream of getting Brexit done
A nation strong and free?
Or do you fear for the vulnerable
Cast aside like human debris?

Deny

They twist reality to their own ends
Tying the truth in knots
Dismissing the data of scientists
Accusing them of making plots

Saying gas and oil drives economies
Creating jobs an indisputable fact
And with growth the only important thing
They'll grab all that can be fracked

And global warming is not a concern
It's all a natural cycle folks
For every few hundred millennia
All life on this planet chokes

The sad thing is we can't make the change
We can either drown or fry
At least while they still have all the power
They'll deny, deny, deny

Spike

When your beautiful car is getting covered in poo
Simply because a bird needs the loo
What springs to mind - to give it a clean?
No, not that, you're far too mean

Instead you look up and see that tree
And rather than how beautiful nature can be
You think, how horrible. Crikey! Yikes!
I must get it covered in sharp metal spikes!

This is the world of the powerful rich
Who do what they want when they have the itch
They disregard nature and disrespect it as well
Don't you just wish they would all go to hell?

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/dec/19/bird-spikes-in-bristol-trees-to-protect-cars-cause-dismay

Trident

Green tipped and glowing
They'll stand in the bays
The phallic obelisks
Of bygone days
Of Cold War paranoia
Gripping us like ice
A fear that is costly
And we pay the price

So why not disarm
With a casual shrug
Surprise all opponents
With a smile and a hug
What should scare us most
Is a doomsday device
Which we happily condone
Without thinking twice

For it does not defend
It retaliates
An eye for an eye
It's revenge that it sates
Can peace only be kept
If we stand at the brink?
On the verge of destruction
Hoping others will blink

But still the world rages
When perhaps it should repent
Over all the lives wasted
Over all the money spent
If there is collective conscience
Then we'll all collect the guilt
When nuclear war commences
Seeing the flower of mankind wilt

Turning

The year is turning
Switching once more
As one window closes
We open the door

New opportunities
To solve all our ills
If we offer some effort
And focus our wills

We've seen refugees
And more bombing raids
Political posturing
And diplomatic charades

The rich have got richer
All their nests to feather
The poor make do with less
Are we still in it together?

While the climate continues
To throw all it can
To prove that it's changing
And yet still we plan

To burn fossil fuels
To exploit and to frack
The only nature we have
And we won't get it back

But with new beginnings
We always have hope
There's no point in weeping
To hide away and mope

We must use our voices
Stand up and say
Think for the future
And choose another way

We must save this planet
As we must save ourselves
From the hurt we have wrought
And we can't invoke elves

Or Gods to save us
In whatever faiths we hold
There is only us
We must learn to be bold

Why not share an idea
Of peace in our time
Sing it or write it
In prose or in rhyme

And fight for the good
Which we all hold within
Express it, describe it
In a New Year
A new world to begin

Contempt

Is it the fault of a token treaty
Or is it just their contempt
That national parks are to be fracked
No longer to be exempt

Giving up our landscapes
And our fresh water supplies
On the lobbying of business
Under a pressure jet of lies

Energy won't be cheaper
And with invading drills deployed
Pollution will kill the wildlife
And beauty will be destroyed

But it's not us who'll reap disaster
We'll not be the ones who'll pay
It will be our children's children
With a wasteland in which to play

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/16/fracking-under-national-parks-approved-by-mps-amid-acrimony

Failures

When a planet saving treaty
Can be diluted
Made insignificant
By claims of a translation error
Then diplomatic failures
Are extant

And worst of all
They dress it up
As some kind of victory
Like Chamberlain's
"Peace in our time"
We know how that turned out to be

If we cannot come together
The same species
In our only world
It's unlikely we'll survive
The climatic changes
To be unfurled

The fear and the violence
As we fight
For scraps of land
We'll surely destroy humanity
More than any
terrorist band

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2015/dec/16/how-a-typo-nearly-derailed-the-paris-climate-deal

Response

A major leap

Or a stumble backwards

Only binding each other

To fate

Money still talks

And the fossil fuels rule

Politicians spin it all

To inflate

But danger remains

For the small island states

Whose weathered beaches

Wither away

And flood risks

For the low lying lands

Will spell annihilation

Some day

Crops will not grow

And the poor will go hungry

But the richest will never

Go without

Water for drinking

Will grow scarcer and scarcer

As raised temperatures put us

In drought

So, honestly

What have they achieved

Than promises, to promise

To have a look

And all they’ve done

Is to fasten the lid

Of the stew pot in which

We’ll all cook

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/13/world-leaders-hail-paris-climate-deal

Change

When the land is flooded
By the rising tide
And the deserts
Grow out from the fields

The animals perish
From lack of a water supply
And crops
See diminishing yields

When we've seen the destruction
Of fossil fuels burned
And results
Of deforestation

When we've been through hunger
And battles for supplies
In the liquefaction
Of civilisation

When our grandchildren's hopes
Are crumbled to dust
When their futures
Are arid, in drought

When humanity's survival
Hangs by a thread
Will there still be
Those who doubt?

And do the MP's
Who don't turn up for debates
Believe their descendents
Will be spared?

Or will they regret
Their neglect and their scorn
When they realise
That they should have cared?

Iceberg

We are drifting
Aimlessly on a current
Of destruction

Burning the products
Of geological forces
Creating forces of our own

We are the iceberg
Calved away from nature's shelf
Heading for calamity

With eyes above the water
We cannot see the behemoth
That floats beneath

Our Titanic continents
Will be on the front line
To be sunk

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/12/collapsing-greenland-glacier-could-raise-sea-levels-by-half-a-metre-say-scientists

Mist

Sunshine is like bathing
In the warm glow of love
Blustery winds are the epitome
Of forces out of our control

Heavy rain belies bitter sadness
Of loss or of death
Snow provides the chill, cold blanket
Of loneliness and lost memory

But mist is the most human
Beguiling us to believe what we wish
Our own prejudices forming distant shapes
Drawing conclusions from the fuzzily half-seen

Clouding out our judgement
And letting us live within our hopes and fears
Keeping us fogged from danger and precarity
So we can dream beyond those opaque borders

Conscience

Money has no conscience
It is neither good nor bad
It is the men who wield it
(And it is always men)
Whose deeds are motive clad

Not caring where it comes from
More interested in it's uses
They'll hold hands with dictators
(Elected, hereditary or otherwise)
And ignore all their abuses

When it comes down to it
What's stronger than greed or lust
Principles are out the window
(Or get blown away)
By the slightest political gust

Honesty is just not valued
It has no intrinsic worth
Yet the power of generosity
(Despite being incalculable)
Really doesn't cost us the Earth

Instead it's all the fighting
Over territory and resources
It's only death that battle brings
(Despite any talk of honour)
Shared amongst opposing forces

And the real truth never goes public
War can be in anyone's name
It never matters who starts it
(The winner is the most just)
In the continual thronal game

So is all hope for us lost?
It is if we let them win
We must clamour for integrity
(Even if they pretend to be deaf)
Making an almighty din

Tell them they can't put money
Ahead of what is right
Freedom of speech and opinion
(Also gender, race, colour and creed)
Commanding only from a moral height

Wasteful

It's not always the public's fault
For the waste they generate
Sometimes it's manufacturers
Who have got us in this state

A wrapper inside a carton
Inside a box inside a wrapper
And with some pretty colours
It really does look dapper

But if companies kept it simple
There would be so much less waste
And we'd be able to keep our bins
Empty, clean and chaste

Lungs

"Advancement through technology"
But for who?
As they turn the wheels at full speed
In their own favour
Steering their computers
To disguise the truth
Driving roughshod over rules
That protect our air
Our lungs
Our environment
Our health
Going through the gears
To protect their profits
At our expense
"The Car" is indeed the killer
In so many ways

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34311819

Without

To live without cash
No stash
Of money in the bank

Work and generous gifts
It lifts
Your spirits to life's joy

Man and nature combined
Entwined
Dependent on each other

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/sep/15/living-without-money-what-i-learned

Black

They prefer to frack
Than have a crack
At renewable energy
They must be getting
Something back
From the fossil companies

Displaying a lack
Of strength, of back-bone
In the face of lobbying
They've given in
And changed their tack
In favour of gas drilling

And now they'll attack
And cleave and hack
At unprotected countryside
Our environment
Will take the whack
Our nature will have died

So when the water's black
We'll have to pack
And be sent to biodomes
And all because
They chose to frack
We will have lost our homes

Human

What special apes we are
The powers we hold
With our minds
The ideas we store
In our hands

Lives we can transform
And fates redirect
We could call ourselves Gods
If not for humility

And one wonders
What we can and will achieve
When we finally realise
How incredible
Each and every one of us is

Runway

It seems to have been
A simple publicity stunt,
For celebrities to back.
A punt on making a name
For themselves, yet lacking,
In honesty and truth.
Undermining a movement
For less pollution,
Giving in to the ruthlessness
Of capitalist vultures,
Who insist on fining the rest of humanity
For their own gain.
And when the runway
Is built, will they be filled
With guilt and despair?
Or be inside those jets
Champagne filled
And choking the air?

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jun/25/heathrow-third-runway-greenpeace-land-sold