Willingly Enslaved

He is one of Nature's
more delicate of
warm-blooded creatures,
supremely entitled, he
believes, to excesses
of kind consideration.

Of especial concern to
him are several matters
of outstanding expectation,
chief among them his
creature comforts and,
of course, his board.

His very small body
finds supreme discomfort
in the awkward vicissitudes
of weather, as neither
excess of hot nor cold
provide a suitable nor
appreciated environment.

As for food, whose fragrance
and enticing sight he
cleaves to with undying
devotion, his tiny pink tongue
and brisk, white teeth
particularly adapted to dispatch,
he has charged us to provide.

It is abundantly clear to
this small creature who deigns
to share with us a living space,
that divine providence supplied
our presence to him for
the singular purpose of
serving his needs well and
truly. We strive to excel.

The Dark Atmosphere

The colour of the day
has been absorbed in its
entirety by the brooding mood
of a sky capped resolutely by
battered, dark clouds extruding
a dense, dark curtain of
unending rain. Forests
bristling with the black shapes
of trees bared for winter;
humped mountain silhouettes
in the dark atmosphere.
A howling wind bursts the neatly
drenching curtain spewing
a horizontal sea of conquest
over the land, cowering in
muddy acquiescence,
urgently placatory, attempting
conciliatory overtures, as
the battle of the rain titans
engulfs reasonable accommodation
and the world settles into a
state of miserable agony where
wind-blasted hurricane-gusts
of rain dance in the dark
atmosphere of wicked collusion.

Life

We are helplessly credulous
innocents submitting to
the faith of belief; black
can be white, the
fantastic credible,
and illusion stark reality.

This is not an obverse
universe, but the
rational one that science
explicates while the
emotional world of psychic
need that trust-addled
humans fallibly inhabit
limps us into the future.

The tumult of uncertainty
in our spirits seeks
assurance for our sadly
wan existence.

Culture

Our original equipment
inherited at the birth
of the species still resonates.
Primeval humankind learned
survival techniques as the
primary imperative. Those
that prevailed, claiming
scarce resources, survived
to leave their genetic
advantages to an unbroken
line of successors, and
in turn practising the
winning formula for
succession through oppression,
denial of equality and
opportunity. To those victors
most certainly went the spoils
and for them life was good
and as it should be. Not
quite so for the far less
advantaged by Nature's
generosity. Their struggle,
their survival continues
vexingly, against the odds
of disadvantage. Bigotry,
xenophobia, racism,
persecution of castes, class
and gender, and the visceral
misery of oppression of the
meek by the bold and the
mighty continue to reveal
Nature's mischievous mystery.