The Dying Bee

Bees 1
“The state represents violence in a concentrated and organized form.
The individual has a soul, but as the state is a soulless machine,
it can never be weaned from violence to which it owes its very existence.” —
Mahatma Mohandas K. Gandhi –

 

Weapons are the United States premier export
So the right marketing strategy is called for,
And that strategy for its number one product- line
Is war – mindless and endless American war.

It turns out that in Bush’s build-up to Iraq,
All the so-called ‘reasons’ were irrelevant:
The US and the Pentagon were hell-bent on war
And nothing would put them off the scent.

While more than half of every US tax dollar
Which its citizens pay to their government
Goes to the US’s military-industrial complex,
US citizens comply with such arrangements.

Bees 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

photo: CCAN/Twitter

The sole escape for a captive, warmongering citizenry
Is to make war upon their own country:
A tough call since the US is a police state
And its democracy’s really a plutocracy –

Whose rash spending of six trillion dollars on war
Over the last four years,
Whilst 1.6 million are homeless and 16 million undernourished
Displays a dangerous poverty of ideas.

Their country was once founded upon an idea
But US ‘freedom’ now has a hollow ring:
It’s as free as a dying bee with misplaced pride
In its unlovely and its redundant sting.

For the last thirty years, sixty percent
Of the US’s national income
Has gone into the pockets of its richest one percent;
Only to be passed onto its privileged children –

Rich kids who jeer at those less fortunate
On their twittering social media,
Betraying passive-aggressive desires to kill them all off
As they record their feelings of hateful hysteria.

“How are you white and homeless?” one whines,
“What a waste of life and opportunity.”
“I wonder if homeless people go to heaven.
“I hate the homeless,” they add with crass insensitivity.

“I don’t feel sorry for them. If you want change
“Then let me throw it as hard as I can at your dirty face.”
“I hate when it gets cold out,” another tweets,
“Cuz then all the homeless people get on the bus.”

“I did my good deed today,” chimes a third,
“I gave some worthless bum a quarter at the mall.”
“I was enjoying a latte when I almost vomited.
“Across the street, I saw a hobo girl.”

“Get back to your side of the bridge. No one likes you.”
“That’s what I wanted to say.”
“A bum tried fighting me last night cus I told him
to get a job haha”

“In all honesty, I kinda don’t feel bad for homeless people.
“Each individual is in control of their life
“And future, so it’s all their fault.”

Another vouchsafes, “If homeless people
“Don’t want to freeze to death,
“Why don’t they just find homes?!
“I mean DUUUUHHHHHH.”

“Never understood why homeless people smell of piss
When you can literally piss anywhere.”
“I hate when homeless people expect us to feel sorry for them
“We all have the same 24 hrs.

“What you chose to do with it is up to you.”
“If home is where the heart is, then are homeless people heartless?”
“All homeless bums are loser drug addict drunks.”

“Maybe if homeless people took care of themselves,
“Maybe if they looked pretty,
“We would want to help them more
“But I don’t help yellow teeth.” [1]

Bees 3
Elena Caldera, ‘Brainmoney-stoneheart’

 

In a country so devoid of a social conscience
Alien objects are ready to fill the vacuum:
Money; guns; dead food; a fetishized military –
All bypass the need for compassion.


Bees 4

Homeless advocate Arnold Abbott, 90, was arrested along feeding the homeless in a park.
Photograph: Lynne Sladky/AP

 

In the US the police arrest people for feeding the homeless
And as a result many homeless have died –
They’ve also been used for random target practice
Revealing the heartless nature of the divide.

 

Bees 5

 

It’s a country with a neurotic death wish
Whose police kill a thousand a year;
Its mass media peddle the self-promotions
Of an armed pornocracy living in fear.

 

Bees 6

If that’s not a pre-revolutionary situation
Then it’s hard to know what is one:
Its rich taunt the poor with their limitless wealth;
The poor are sickened by their destitution.

Meanwhile the pollinating honey bee is dying;
Killed off by the greediest nation in history –
Bludgeoning soil with chemical hammers to speed growth
And polluting air to fog the bees’ trajectory.

 

Heathcote Williams

 

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[1] Online comments collected by the Canadian homeless charity, Raising the Roof, 2015

 

 

 

 

 


By Heathcote Williams

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One Response to The Dying Bee

    1. Well said !
      Good luck !

      Comment by Capt Pugwash on 29 May, 2015 at 11:55 am

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