A Present Peril

Tags

Australian poet, limerick, Limerick poem, Limerick poetry, poem, poetry

𝐀 𝐏𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐏𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐥

We are their avowed enemies,
Yet we do and we say as we please.
From our numerous spires
We call out: “Stoke the fires!”
While they worry about the Chinese.

— D.N. O’Brien

Two Worlds

Tags

Australian poet, poem, poetry, State Secrecy, State secrets, Triolet, Two Worlds

Two Worlds

There are two worlds — just one is known by most.
It is the one that everybody sees.
The other haunts the shadows like a ghost.
There are two worlds — just one is known by most,
And those who know the second never post
Its whereabouts, and where are kept the keys.
There are two worlds — just one is known by most.
It is the one that everybody sees.

— D.N. O’Brien

Confined Old Codger Couplets

Tags

Australian poet, Covid-19 lock-down, poem, poetry, Rhyming couplets, WuFlu lock-down

𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐝 𝐎𝐥𝐝 𝐂𝐨𝐝𝐠𝐞𝐫 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐬

The old man has seen plagues and war,
But not such foolishness before.

He stares out from his lonely cave,
And thinks the Swedes are rather brave.

He’d take his chances — stand and fight,
But that no longer is his right.

They say they wish to keep him well.
He’d tell them all to go to Hell.

Old friends and places he’ll not see,
If he dies in captivity.

— D.N. O’Brien

An Application to Track

Tags

Australian poet, Covid-19, poem, poetry, Tracking App, Tracking by mobile phone, Triolet, WuFlu crisis

𝐀𝐧 𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐨 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐤

You never thought that it would come to this?
A crisis, it excuses such excess.
These clowns, you thought, were just taking the piss —
You never thought that it would come to this.
Their useful fools will salivate and hiss:
“It’s for the common good!” Come on confess —
You never thought that it would come to this —
A crisis, it excuses such excess.

— D.N. O’Brien

Australian Government to track citizens exposed to virus

The Waiting Wog

Tags

Australian poet, Covid-19, Covid-19 lock-down, limerick, Limerick poem, Limerick poetry, poem, poetry, WuFlu crisis

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐖𝐚𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐖𝐨𝐠

Big Brother the masses is guiding,
As in their safe spaces they’re hiding.
But come out they must
When settles the dust.
The virus, its time it is biding.

— D.N. O’Brien

23 Weeks

Tags

Abortion in Australia, Australian poet, poem, poetry, Triolet

𝟐𝟑 𝐖𝐞𝐞𝐤𝐬

It’s 3 and 20 weeks I’m aiming for;
If I can live till then I may survive.
To not end up discarded blood and gore,
It’s 3 and 20 weeks I’m aiming for.
I’m hiding in my bunker — this is war,
And I’ll be lucky to emerge alive.
It’s 3 and 20 weeks I’m aiming for;
If I can live till then I may survive.

— D.N. O’Brien

No questions asked abortion up to 22 weeks

Suffering

Tags

Australian poet, Formal poetry, poem, poetry, Snowflakes, Suffering, Triolet, Weakness

𝐒𝐮𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠

You’re suffering? — Oh please, give me a break!
Oh sure — no one has suffered quite like you.
You persecuted (privileged) snowflake —
You’re suffering? — Oh please, give me a break!
You’re in a dream from which you need to wake,
For you are blessed — one of the lucky few.
You’re suffering? — Oh please, give me a break!
Oh sure — no one has suffered quite like you.

— D.N. O’Brien

As Simple as ABC

Tags

ABC, ABC bias, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Australian poet, Left wing media, limerick, Limerick poem, Limerick poetry, poem, poetry

𝐀𝐬 𝐒𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞 𝐚𝐬 𝐀𝐁𝐂

To the young and converted they preach.
There are few who their sermons don’t reach.
Minds they shape with the dough
That they take from their foe.
“We are balanced and fair!” — loud they screech.

I avoid “their” ABC like I avoid the plague (even the present one) but I am forced to listen to ABC radio once a week while prisoner of my acupuncturist — pinned down, so to speak. He’s Chinese by the way (boy, aren’t they copping some flack) and assures me that he also hates the ABC, but I have my doubts as he always has the bastards on — maybe he’s a masochist — I know he’s a torturer.

It’s really a shame the way this once great organization has fallen. I grew up with the ABC — I used to love it. I guess it was pretty much to the left even back then, but I suppose it had more class collectively than to blatantly push its lefty ideas. Now it has gone way too far down the far-left well-beaten track to ever return. It’s very feminine I noticed (except for some of their female presenters of course); very soft and squishy and fluffy and loving and caring — at least on the surface; it drips feminism, and masculinity is nowhere to be found.

Judging by the last federal election, around half of the tax-payers who fund the ABC could be fairly described as to the right, and yet “their” ABC is a conservative-free zone; the presenters are all lefties and they pretty much only interview lefties and get lefty opinions — unless of course they decide to set up a hit job on some naive conservative who should know better than to trespass onto their turf. They hate Trump and Boris of course and love Jacinda — the former president of the International Union of Socialist Youth.

Overall it is a sad story: a national broadcaster (if one is needed at all) should of course represent all to as high a degree as possible; but it seems to me that the ABC has an insurmountable problem: many of its presenters and presumably its management really believe that they are right — that they are of the virtuous left and it is their duty to get that message of enlightenment out there.

The ABC is beyond saving — it can’t be transformed back into its former self. I’m not sure even privatizing it would make much difference. What to do about their ABC? There’s no simple solution.

— D.N. O’Brien

Social Animals

Tags

Australian poet, Communism, Deaths due to Communism, epigram, poem, poetry, Socialism, Soviet Union

𝐒𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐀𝐧𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐥𝐬

The Soviets destroyed nobility;
The savages rose up to take control —
Harnessed the rest to serve futility;
And twenty million was the final toll.

— D.N. O’Brien

Cold War

Tags

Australian poet, Covid-19 lock-down, limerick, Limerick poem, Limerick poetry, poem, poetry

𝐂𝐨𝐥𝐝 𝐖𝐚𝐫

We are being cooled down by degrees.
Pretty soon we will be in deep freeze.
We are told it’s a war,
But like no war before.
If it’s war we must take casualties.

— D.N. O’Brien