What an amazing scientific and engineering feat to send an unmanned vehicle through space and successfully land on Mars. If it continues according to plan, samples of the planet’s ‘soil’ will be gathered up and returned to NASAs laboratories for analysis.
Here our scientists have made equally remarkable achievements developing, producing, and delivering vaccines quickly, to combat the deadly virus that is ending so many lives prematurely.
What will be the cost of these two historical achievements?
The latter has been an urgent life-saving matter across our planet.
The former is an expensive survey of the past life and structure of one of our close neighbours. Is it the best use of money, private or public?
Our planet is in trouble. It’s polluted and getting hotter; we must turn our eyes away from Mars and put every concerted effort and finance into saving our planet NOW.
How can we plan for tomorrow when our today’s world is slipping away?
These concerns are not new. It prompted me to express my anxiety through several poems in my set of six books POEMS BY AN OLD CODGERBOOK FOUR contains one such poem and I offer it here for your consideration.
STOP THE WORLD, I WANT TO GET OFF
An Apology
An utterance of despair I would not scoff,
“Stop the world, I want to get off”.
Littlechap pleaded, living his selfish life,
In the 1961 Newley-Bricusse story of human strife.
Searching for something better, always dissatisfied,
The grass is greener on the other side.
That old codger, like many more may pose,
Finally realised that what he sought was under his nose.
Now, we need to stop the world, it’s time to change
Our lifestyle, greed, discontent, across the range.
Disharmony, brutality, inhumanity, all must end,
A world-wide message I have to send.
So, let us stop the world and start again,
There is now far too much grief and pain,
Excessive drought, excessive rain,
Our eco-system is under strain.
Stop the world and let us assess the situation,
An audit of each country’s contribution
Towards our global maladministration,
And then seek a corrective course of action.
Stop the world, let’s think it through,
Spell out what each country has to do.
Eliminate waste, and plastic too,
Feed the hungry, put every foot into a shoe.
Stop the world, it’s out of balance,
Everyone needs equal sustenance.
Share our drinking water, bread, and food,
Protection from searing sun and flood.
Stop the world we cannot breathe,
There is so much we can achieve.
If only we all worked together,
Clean air, clear water, stable weather.
I make no apology for my deep concerns,
For I am one who has seen the patterns.
The warning signs, the evidence now so clear,
The inaction by those who rule and those governing
by fear.
I stand guilty of ‘asleep at my post’ with my peers,
Of contributing to the earth’s sickness over the years.
Ignorance of cause and effect by what we have done,
Of action and reaction, and now we have a hotter sun.
My concerns have been expressed before,
I feel responsible looking back over 80 years and more.
On behalf of my fellow chums, most of late repose,
Apologies, for a poisoned chalice not a red, red, rose.
………………
Copyright 2023 Neil Davies
If you have enjoyed this poem, why not buy a copy of my books, or better still, tell your friends and family, and support my charity.
Available on AMAZON BOOKS,
THE BRITISH RED CROSS UKRAINE APPEAL
Thank you,
Stay Safe,Neil.