-We eat unremarkable food and agonise from time to time over the price of a piece of fillet steak
Or some of us learn to content ourselves with non-nutritious chemical substitutes
Whilst others among us scrabble around for scraps to eat
Or simply starve
In alley-ways not yet designated prime real-estate by they who hate us all
See, this is this common thread that links us all
We are all
All of us, despite our perceived statuses
Despised by people who never have to choose, who never have to surrender indulgence, who hate the sight of those who starve, yet are conversely reassured by their ongoing existence
Economic vampires
Deathly white, sat in the back of black limousines tour the slums and hellish corners
Of our hijacked cities after dark
Hissing at the remaining ever-dwindling social housing
Hungrily clawing at the leather seats
Barely containing their blood-lust for the scattered remnants of the working-classes
Social cleansing is the sucking dry of the lifeblood of this city
And the corporate vampire shall not be sated
Not till the uninhibited sound of childhood laughter
Is driven once and for all from these few remaining streets
And as for us, during this calm before the scheduled storm
Our lives are barely tolerated
Providing we do not sit atop some precious minerals
Or our meagre dwellings do not interrupt the path of so-called progress
Tolerated, for now, at least until the next engineered clearance is okayed by a compliant government – or a corrupt council
Or a judiciary hired to legitimise the perpetuation of wealthy expansionism
Until then
They look upon us with hungry scorn
Unaware that many among us long ago prepared our pointed wooden stakes
Ready for their inevitable descent from out of a dark sky dimly lit by a blood-red moon
And on the date and time of their inevitable appearances
We shall be waiting outside our meagre homes
To conduct long-awaited and way-overdue clearances of our very own
Don’t look the homeless man in the eye
Hold your chin up as you walk by
Just another revolting peasant
Trying to get some free pay
They’ve all got jobs and houses anyway
Foodbank collectors, scrounging again
Why should you pay for society’s drains?
Just another revolting peasant
Trying to get a free meal
Don’t they know what you’ve just spent on that used car deal?
Tut as you pass the nurse picket line
Agitators complaining though everything’s fine
Just another revolting peasant
Protesting for ages
They knew when they trained that they’d get shit wages
The teachers are lying, schools have all they need
Wanting funding for books is just unbridled greed
Just another revolting peasant
Trying to game the system
They should quit if they can’t do the job, we’d not miss ’em
Ignore the police, pay ‘em no mind
Just scaremongering of the worst kind
Just another revolting peasant
Trying to make a scene
We all know the service is more funded than its ever been
Ignore all these protests, there’s nothing to see
These lefties aren’t like you and me
Just another revolting peasant
Who won’t understand
Inequality is a virtue of this land
Don’t listen to the shouting in the streets
It’s only the riff raff complaining they can’t afford to eat
The peasants are revolting all over the land
Calling that it’s time to make a stand
But you
You sit in front of the telly
While we promise you glory
You be a good peasant
And be sure to vote Tory
When it came into our cellar, the rat
brought fear with it, fear that lingers even
though the rat itself is long dead, poisoned
by the blue pellets that we fed to it.
Like the burglar that came the year before,
we thought we might have glimpsed it once or twice
in the garden, or the gutter, sudden
recognition at the eyes rim. Vermin.
Even so, lifting its stiffened corpse on a
trowel, the long whip of its tail rigid
as a lockpick, I felt – what? – compassion?
Something, perhaps, akin to pity for
this marginal creature, embodiment
of our detritus, bearing our nightmares.
