Author Archives: thebardofkelvindale.com

Woke World

Woke World

Woke: definition – Alert to injustice in society

Most might declare that speech should be ‘free’
But how far that should go you might not agree
Should we always consider the feelings of others?
How our words might affect all our sisters and brothers

And not just our words but our actions too
Our deeds that with meaning we therefore imbue
The words of our lips and our bodies’ exertion
Fruits of our efforts, our lives expressing

In recent times the concept of ‘woke’
Strong feelings of injustice now evoke
Not just wrong doings in this present age
But perpetrated by ancestors in our heritage

It seems that colonial conquests in far flung lands
Demand expiation by our modern hands
Historical ventures, voyages to discover
Require our atonement their status to recover

Modern ‘wokists’ alert us to time honoured street names
Derived from eminent citizens who’s worth we acclaimed
Their dark deeds now exposed brings them denigration
Complete overturning of their fine reputation

Politicians, Poets, Pioneers, Knights of the Realm
By their imperialist exploits the earth overwhelmed
Time now to do penance for world domination
Let’s all take the knee, this hubristic nation

We all must learn to be truly humble
Applaud as proud statues made to crumble
Slave traders rightfully vilified
Acknowledge the blood of all who died

Doubtless the intention of the worldwide woke movement
In rampant discrimination to secure much improvement
A worthy ambition in this modern age
But why of times past must there be so much rage?

To reappraise history a worthwhile endeavour
But must we take blame for all evil whenever?
Acknowledge what’s passed is the best we can do
A more honourable path in future pursue

Meantime help to build a world more equitable
Discrimination and prejudice no longer inevitable
Thus the woke movement will eventually achieve
The widespread acclaim that it yearns to receive

Ken Fisher

You’re Muted!

You’re Muted!

The dictionary defines “mute” as
Adjective:
Refraining from speech
or temporarily speechless

Noun:
A person lacking the faculty of speech
A device on a phone or TV or another appliance
That turns off the sound

But since the advent of the extensive
use of the Zoom app
Mute, has gained a whole
lot more significance

Thus:
You appear on our screens
Your frame illuminated
Moving lips can be seen
But all sound confiscated

Your body language is quite animated
Wishing the current topic to be debated
But no sound can be heard in our attentive ears
Your impact on us simply disappears

We know the problem of which you’re unaware
We all try to tell you with a waving fanfare
But all our signals somehow go unseen
Only silence emerges from your flickering screen

At last, bemused by our gestures you reach the conclusion
Between us and you there is some confusion
We all want to ensure that you participate
To achieve this your mike needs to activate

The penny then drops and falls down the chute
It dawns on you that you must simply un-mute
And to the cheers of all who anxiously wait
You click the icon to let sound emanate

And so at last we achieve that blessed concord
When we can see you and hear every word
Un-muting is vital for full participation
But only if the host grants that dispensation

Ken Fisher

Gobbledegook

Gobbledegook

No matter how hard I try
To pierce the impenetrable
To fathom the who or why
Make sense of the unintelligible

The problem is language obscure
Using terms utterly recondite
Employed as if quite de jure
But devoid of any clear light

Gobbledegook is a device
Intended to increase prestige
So that when you get any advice
You will acknowledge true expertise

But the problem then seems to be
No matter how many the words
It sheds even less light for me
And you may find it quite absurd

Have you ever tried to make sense
Of a modern job application?
Terms defying all common-sense
No clue to the real occupation

Strategic plans are quite renowned
To result in much obfuscation
In management-speak they abound
‘Road maps’ with a vague destination!

All this clever sleight of hand
Spawned the profession of ‘consultant’
They have developed their own pricey brand
To make jobs for executives now redundant

In the world of the academic
It is vital to be thinking profound
In their lofty submissions polemic
Opacity with mystery compound

In every field jargon seems to triumph
Theology, Astronomy, Medicine, Mathematics
It sounds like some professional alliance
Our ignorance their intended contrivance

It would seem if they simplify
That the layperson might understand
Making sense of that who and that why
The giddy heights they’d no longer command

Thus gobbledegook has proliferated
Plain ideas wrapped up in disguise
Our plea is to be liberated
Then they might open our eyes!

Ken Fisher

Snow

Snow

Noiseless in the night
This crystal blanket falls
Carpeting wherever
Without discrimination

Roofs and gardens
Streets and parkland
Trees and plants
Offer no resistance

At first so pristine
Then humanity makes its imprint
Footsteps, tyre tracks, dog paws
Even brand new plastic sledge trails

Eyes screwed up against reflected sunbeams
Dark glasses donned out of season
Bodies enveloped in warm attire
Mufflers and woolly hats with pom poms abound

Children cavort
Parents compete
Snow balls, Snow fights, Snow men [women?]
Igloos and snow forts

A paradise for the young
A hazard zone for the elderly
The young pray that it lasts
The old pray that it melts

Snow will do its own thing!

Ken Fisher

FOMO – Fear of Missing Out

FOMO
[Fear of Missing Out]

Apart from the dreaded virus
Is this the malady of our age?
FOMO – Fear Of Missing Out

But what might be the missing items?
Could it be some of these?

When you are just a young girl or boy
You simply must have the latest toy
It’s no use being told these things are just trash
And your parents can’t afford to spend so much cash

As you grow into those teenage years
FOMO brings on some serious fears
Unless you can sport the trendiest gear
Your complete deprivation will bring on a tear!

You loudly declare that all of your in-crowd
Have smart phones and tablets of which to be proud
You have missed out in this tech revolution
And demand that your parents find a solution

After schooling’s complete you need to progress
A top university is bound to be best
But your school achievements are rather pathetic
No clear indication of the mind academic

In time you emerge with an unimpressive degree
To the working world you’ve been set free
But where is that promise of a future so bright?
I am sorry to say it’s nowhere in sight

Eventually you aspire to some modest employment
Into which your limited talents might find deployment
Job satisfaction is the least of your care
But the minimum wage you consider unfair

On somewhere to live you must not miss out
The old family home is no place to hangout
But the bank manager soon puts you into a rage
When he declares the cost of a mortgage

And so FOMO continues as you progress through life
Why so much pressure to find husband or wife?
There is nothing wrong with the single life
One way of avoiding continual strife

But if you do eventually tie the knot
Married or partnered it matters not
In due time FOMO might well arise
If no baby appears for you to baptise

Next, in your job, you miss out on promotion
This results in a display of rampant emotion
The world is patently unfair and unjust
Is there no-one left in whom you can trust?

And so as you go through all of life’s phases
You’re afraid you’ll miss something at each of these stages
You wonder if you will ever be set free from this tension
When at last you are granted the meagre state pension

What is the moral of this woeful tale?
You should not allow FOMO to be some kind of blackmail
You should completely expunge all these irrational fears
And Missing Out phobia will soon disappear

Ken Fisher

Tech Frenzy

Tech Frenzy

We have been forced to learn fast
‘Cause we need to survive
And new methods of working
We have all had to contrive

The office largely abandoned
For much of the time
Work geographically scattered
Is the new paradigm

Between every worker
Covid-19 demands enough space
All employees screened off
A mask on each face

Our home computer devices
Are working flat out
To keep up with demand
While office health is in doubt

All of us must improve our tech skills
This pressure puts many into a frenzy
Grasping the basics of Skype, Teams, and Zoom
A predicament few laymen would envy

Some say home working is just what they want
It gives them a freedom the office denies
But others claim that isn’t quite true
Monitored there by electronic “spies”

But it looks as if this is the new reality
Get tech savvy is the only road to success
Master the realms of cyberspace and the cloud
In all these techniques you need show your finesse

Ken Fisher

 

The Painted Lady by Oliver Fisher

The Painted Lady by Oliver Fisher

On a walk to clear the mind,
Leave the kids, refuel on food.
Her bunnet slouches, kind of rude,
Cuff links cuffed and tie done up.

She bears a face-covering
That blankets the soul in this self inflicted
Unprecedented yet pre-predicted
Predicament she finds herself in

The boy next door is out of touch,
Clueless, dumb and unaware.
She paints her face and sternly stares,
Lying, in her underwear.

Her house is tatty, not a home.
Hollow hallways, stagnant air.
A dusty phone, nicotine stained,
Hasn’t rung and she doesn’t care.

In the mirror, facial warping.
Tears are falling upside down
And drowning in her dressing gown
Has got to be safer than walking.

If only she’d the luck of others,
Lucky them and their reflection.
Brittle brushes scratch her skin
And Mother’s hair fades thin in sections.

Her trolley trundles forward slowly,
Those coat pockets feel so cosy,
The boy next door is getting nosy
But bony bones make her feel lonely.

On a walk to break the mind,
Starving Mother, smiling child.
Her head is bald, bare faced grin.
Standing, naked, in the light.

Oliver Fisher

Stooshie

Stooshie

[An uproar or commotion, or a minor row of sorts]

Here’s a word of which the English may be unaware
One of those obscure terms which we might share
It’s used to describe a row or a commotion
An argument with signs of stirred emotion

It’s not quite as serious as all-out war
And any fisticuffs we would deplore
More like a skirmish of the verbal kind
Where opponents are readily maligned

Stooshies can arise at any time or place
Sometimes only two contenders face to face
At others the arena is on a grander scale
Unparliamentary language used opponents to impale

A cause celebre might well a stooshie generate
Or some long-held grudge cause others to berate
Or perhaps just even some minor irritation
The trigger for much unnecessary vexation

Stooshies, perhaps depending on the situation
May be of short or quite prolonged duration
Perpetual stooshies are really a vendetta
Likened to the plot of some tragic operetta

Stooshies, on the whole, are best avoided
Deep divisions thus remain unexploited
Endeavour to ignore all discourse acrimonious
Conducting your affairs with speech harmonious

Ken Fisher

The Motherboard by Oliver Fisher

The Motherboard by Oliver Fisher

A new kind of special, previously familiar
But long since discovered and lived.
Lived fully, to live and move on and be-
happy as Larry and Larry is happy…
When he’s with you.

And in the easter hay, the sun
Reveals a light that brightens none
But turned against itself and won
The dream is had by one more than one.

An entangled tunnel of twists and turns
That strangle the current and commit forceful expansion.
But I’m relaxing and peaceful, blissful tears are streaming…
As the years are passing.

I’ll pour out the old sludge from my blue rusty bucket
Polish and dust so a new reflection reflects
I need to care, I’m done saying **** it-
Click into place and my network connects.

Oliver Fisher

Vaccination Frustration

Vaccination Frustration

Have you not yet had that call?
To turn up at surgery or hall
Ready with your arm laid bare
At your age It’s only fair

But are you waiting for the call?
Abiding by the protocol
Not trying to skip the queue
Stoical but feeling blue

The government tells us to keep calm
A short delay will do no harm
But even those who’ve had jab one
Demand jab two be quickly done

So all this amounts to much frustration
Pent-up demand throughout the nation
The powers that be do sympathize
Preferring we don’t criticise

But we are told to bide our time
Eventually it’ll all be fine
The experts know what they are doing
To avert the threats that might be brewing

No gloomy thoughts should dominate
Some slight delay should not frustrate
Don’t sit at home and darkly brood
Try to adopt a cool Zen mood

Ken Fisher

Indigo Dreams by Oliver Fisher

Indigo Dreams by Oliver Fisher

A moment, as tense as taught string,
Has passed in an instant, not worth remembering.
But am I forgetting? Or are dreams
Materialised in such ways that make them Immune to remembrance, in the first place.

To find a place and call it home,
Where sinking deep is easy but drowning people scream and moan.
The rippled water waits adjourned
And slanted paragraphs reborn
As we find home in place: unknown

My phone is loud and trees are sprouting,
Kids are shouting, people floating-
Yet no peace.
No sense of equilibrium restored,
Half the population bored
And everyday, children bored
From weeping mothers, bound by cord.

The way the world is run has changed,
Days that come are rearranged,
Familiar faces and places estranged
As those we know escape their cage

For-longing they were but
Time has passed,
Seas coagulate and congeal so fast
Brighter days don’t seem to amass
When in the shadow of God, we turn to crass.

So roots in grass lay still and flourish,
Duck the radar, eternal internist,
And if you seek then you shall find
And hold a place with me in earnest.

Oliver Fisher