William A Gardner
7
August
2024
Culture and Societies
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The Time Has Come
The sun was shining oh so hot
Upon the field and stream
A young girl lay down in the grass
And she began to dream
Of boys and love and pulchritude
And what they really mean
She called upon the spirit world
Her pleading not refused
Oh help me understand a world
Where boys and girls confused
With hate and fear spread far and near
And common sense abused
Then in her mind soft and kind
A voice spoke loud and clear
Fear not young lass for it shall pass
Pray do not shed a tear
But welcome love so tenderly
And believe not what you hear
The world is full of cycles
Idiocy comes and goes
Ignorance and want we often flaunt
Within mankind it flows
So keep your head the spirit said
And nurture that which grows
Our natural world is strong and hale
Each spring it blooms anew
With tree and flower 'round the bower
Such lovely scents imbue
The seasons follow peak and hollow
And death and life renew
But what of hate and pain she said
Our world is tilting wrong
Lost harmony of land and sea
The lark has lost its song
Where are the rhymes of happy times
And where do we belong
The time has come the spirit said
To talk of dismal things
Of debt and wars and genocide
Of leaders and boy kings
And if the sea will really boil
And surely pigs have wings
Mankind has made an awful mess
A monumental kludge
With growing want and poverty
Huge debts that will not budge
The workers see a dwindling hope
And many hold a grudge
The leaders fear the end is near
They skate on fragile ice
We must deflect this angry talk
Of competence and vice
Consult the Chat but mind the cat
And find the best advice
Quick as a wink the answer came
From those who knew the score
Deflect the blame to something else
Use climate, germs, and war
Bend the crowd with headlines loud
And focus on fear and gore
Control the journal and the web
Free speech is so passé
Then redefine the meaning
Of words to make them gray
Denounce the bloggers who speak out
And send them far away
Oh spirit true proclaimed the girl
Must these things surely be
How can I live unless you give
Some hope and certainty
I fear the shadows that you show
And long for clarity
How can I love and bear a child
With tidings so forlorn
Any future full of hope
Will certain be stillborn
Renew my faith, sooth my soul
And mend that which is torn
The spirit knew the future clear
Our world could come undone
Such things had happened many times
Sad tidings whence to come
Fear not it said just keep your head
And be not oh so glum
You have the answer in your soul
To triumph over fear
Show patience, love and tolerance
To those you hold most dear
Pray use the time and know the rhyme
And peace will dry your tear
Your world is in a shylock grip
Where money rules and poor forlorn
The leaders lie with shifty eye
While institutes and men suborn
Ere war and hunger drive the storm
And thus a new world born
Yet hope is like the hyacinth
It springs to life anew
Awake the lie will pass you by
For truth will yet renew
So choose your path and speak the word
And find it within you.
Notes and References
Victorian nonsense poetry was a genre during a period of great change in the late 1800s. One of the poems in this genre was The Walrus and the Carpenter by Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodson) of which I always remembered one verse in particular which started, "the time has come, the Walrus said." At that time the Industrial Revolution was forcing huge changes in society and affecting people's lives for both good and bad. Charles Dickens was a writer at that time who chronicled the effects of these changes.
Another story by Dickens is The Christmas Carol in which Scrooge, when presented with his own death by the Spirit of Christmas' Yet to Come, wails, "Are these the shadows of the things that will be, or are they shadows of the things that may be only?" Similarly, in this poem the girl fears the shadows of circumstances which may come to pass.
Today our society is experiencing changes of a similar magnitude with the Information Revolution and the shift to a multipolar geopolitical world. This decade of the twenties, and likely beyond, is and will be a time of confusion, challenge, and change.
Alice in Wonderland was a popular story by Lewis Carroll published in 1865. In that story there is a Chesire Cat which mysteriously appears and disappears. It represents the idea of illusion, ambiguity and uncertainty. The cat in that story predates quantum mechanics yet the idea of the disappearing cat was used in the proposition of Schrödinger's Cat used to elucidate the strange nature of quantum mechanics. In this poem the cat represents the inability of leaders to predict what future their actions will create.
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