COVID 15 - The Worker

I'm a worker,
They've closed the factory
I went in this morning
And the shift ended at three
I have a zero hour contract
Nothing for me to do
You get nothing for nothing
No lunch is free
I wonder what I'm going to say to my wfe when I get home
Honey I lost job, well will I end up on my own
And I have a family to support
Yes Universal credit, well its fine if you can get it
It take six weeks just to get it
And I have mouths to feed
You don't by on nothing
Nothing but poverty
That is looking at an empty fridge
And having kids screaming for their tea

You know I never thought it was much
This job down rows and rows
Stcks and stacks of shoes
Convey belts endless days, abuse
But there were my colleagues
And we had a laugh
I donno what half of them will be doing now
Oh sure there were the lucky ones the full timers
The crows, the ones who cling on until retirement
This factory floor is all they know
But you know it ain't simple
And you know it ain't fair
Nobody has been offering full time contracts for years over there
There is always cheaper workers
They can bring in from abroad
Or if not that then it will be the robots
Who can man the factory floor

Man - man -what a word
I don't feel like a man anymore
You take away his work what is he good for?
You take away his chance to earn, keep his dignity
It should be against the law
But they're making these amendments, special measures
Passing bills, they are taking away our life blood our right
To live is what they kill
It isn't in the spirit of the constitution
To say a man ain't allowed to work
To provide for the family institution
It isn't like the unions have any power anymore
But still we have to fight for our right
Before they kick shut the door

The power ain't with the worker
It's with the man in power
It's with the managers and fat controllers of operations
The worker is dysfunctional, he has feelings that aren't logical
And a robot can do his job faster with no complaining at all
I worry for the future even when this all blows over, how many factories and warehouses will
Realise they can't rely on human labour and will install
Instead the mechanical slave time savers
Then when we go back it will be on the unemployment lines
For sure

Love is

Love is just a freedom
Love is just a bird
Love is a reason
For making up a word
Love is you and bleeding
Love is what you've heard
Love is every single expression
You have ever learned

Love is in an alley way
Love is blinded by the light
Love is out of my way
Love is out of sight
Love is on the free way
Being waved down by the law
Love is are you going my way
And why don't you love me anymore

Love is in the shingles, in the beach and on the rocks
Love is surviving ship wrecks, pursuits and electric shocks
Love is all the stupid things that you will try to do
Love is trying be someone you're not
To keep them loving you
Love is all the lying all the twisted sworded games
Love is when your hairs alight and no one's there to douse the flames
Love is being mocked by the joker now in chains
Love is being locked in a prison with its name

Love is shooting stars, its shooting fish in a barrel
Love is driving cars through people singing carols
Love is all the brakes dropped off when you're rolling down a hill
Love is what you should have done, if you had time enough to kill
Love is talking backwards the mirage in the sun
Love walking up to the point of the woman with the gun
Love is getting shot and its coming back to life
Love is waking up every morning with your wife

Love is spoiling lettuces, its measels in the factory
Love is serving sentences for the crimes against humanity
Love is doing time for all the wars lost
Love is drawing short straws on loves true cost
Love is noting down the time of the crime
Drawing round the body, with bloody line
Love is making safe the streets
So love can walk and pine
Over each and every man he meets
And woman in her prime
Love is shaking everybody, like an earthquake from below
Love is the boxer on the ropes reeling from the blow
Love is walking on the street with the black widow
Giving her your seat on the bus back home

COVID 14 -The School Teacher

They've sent us all home oh what am I to do
My lovely students - and none of them had the flu
Some of them the young ones they were crying,
As I waved good bye to them my hanky flying
That's it for the term here at school-the year is over
Now we have to see how we can teach them online
Talk about sickness cover
It makes more sense to just send them on holiday
An enforced kind of prison break
Where they are held captive at home for 8 weeks
By their parents
But that won't happen it is too severe
But maybe extreme circumstances call for extreme measures
For the young ones the parents will have to be the teachers
I can't see it working, not long term after a couple of weeks
They will be pulling their hair out

Then there are the older ones who will be taking their exams, they are gone for good
And how will they revise, on what, and what support
Most of my teachers are not fully tech-savvy they will have to
learn to be online that's all
Its just a completely different kettle of fish
Half the time you can't see the students
Then they can't hear you
The annoying ones turn off their cameras right on cue
When you begin to ask them a question
And the teenagers are just shy
To speak in front of a teacher one to one or in front of others
Takes boldness, but they can try

You see and then you have the factor that they must show their homes
And they do not feel comfortable sharing that with others
Except over the phone
And what about the ones who have poor family relations
They are trapped at home, with little social consolation
I think this high lights the strengths of the internet age
And its failings
We have these institutions and they are more than places of education
For many troubled souls they are sanctuaries
Places of social support and community away from
A domestic disturbance, and now they can't get away
And the internet is no place to be searching for an escape
In certain situations
So we will do our best us teachers
Keep buggering on as Churchill said
Now we must practice what he preaches

COVID 13- homeless man

I am a homeless man I get no news
But someone told me the PM said to stay home
So I am amused,
I've got no home to begin with man
Self-isolate?
I've already tried it, for more years than I would care to remember
Or can
No I'm a homeless man the street is my home,
Or forest near the gritty city,
Where I can look down on all that pretty sight
I'm a king in my arborial home
On my tree stump home in a little grotto of vines
On the side of the hill is where I reside

Oh but my brothers they bother me, they say come to my church return inside
But I'm afraid, so afraid of being indoors
What the virus has no worse fate for me than the claustrophobic clause
I sign no rental agreement
I'm beholden unto no man
The shop doorways are my bedsteads
And since they are all closed
I'm free to lie in peacefully
Without the morning drone of traffic or some shop keeper
With a broom sweeping me onto the pavement

The only thing you have to be worried about is the cops though
Since they made it illegal to be homeless, I became a criminal overnight
Still the food banks are still open
Or so I thought, when I went down there yesterday there was nought,
Panic buying the kind lady says,
There's not enough supplies in the supermarket
And no body can afford to give
So you see that is life on the thin end of the wedge
But I don't know what else I'll do, its a way of life
This living on a knife edge

COVID12 - The Politician

You see mine is a fine line that one must tread
A little too stern, and you're dead
Public assassination
A little too soft, and you're kicked off the stage
To jeers of rage,
And then it's resignation
Yes its a hard life this Political calling

And 24 hours is a long time in politics especially in the middle of
A covid crisis, its a pandemic, for Jesus' sake,
Ok it was only an epidemic last week
We made a mistake, which governments are entitled to do - I think?
We have the best brains in epidemiology working on it at the moment
And we must time it just right, taking many factors into consideration
It was the boffins and egg heads who came up with these guidelines
I own them, alright yes, I take responsibility for the death toll
20000 lives, that's the prediction, but bloody hell who knows
Here or there a few souls slip through the net, that is wastage
Yes, yes, the are not just number or figures, they are real human beings,
Yes, and who will pay my taxes if you all shuffle off your coils?

So this is my line keep calm and carry on, we need to keep the country going
We can't just ground to a halt, stiff upper lip, suffer the assault
Like the beaches at Normandy - Oh no Dunkirk- no that was a withdrawal
Well you know same thing haul up the draw bridges, we're on our own
Great British Fighting spirit -do it for the Queen

Queen - What! I'm thinking of moving to Canada with Harry and Megan
They seem to know what in the hell they are doing - the only ones I feel PM, Hmm?!

PM - Quite right Your Majesty
Anyway its 24 hours later here are my Policy changes
Everyone must stay in doors
Damn we should have done this last Sunday cough, cough
Excuse me PM we didn't catch that was it an apology?
No, no I was just clearing my throat, got a little tickle you know
Blasted press conferences - journalists always trying to run the show
Well not on my watch!
So what about schools PM?
What about 'em Barry, hmm, no Tony no Giles, no Jim, yes Jim
Old Jim Bob of the Guardian!
Well, my, we go back a long way - ....sorry , yes right Schools!
Do we close them?
Yes right we must close the schools, all children to stay at home with their parents
But they still have to work PM
Right well why can't the grand parents look after them?
But they are in the vulnerable age category in self-isolation!
Right well you are splitting hairs now, do you want to catch this blasted virus or something?
Just get on with it - oh and Police are now empowered to use more draconian methods
We can fine you or arrest you for breaking the curfew
What about the Prisoners?
Well half of the prisoners will be set free to make room for all the members of the public who
Will be breaking the curfew in the coming weeks
So our streets will be a lot safer
Hey we might even draft in some of those released criminals to become a sort of back up special
forces team to back up the regular officers on the beat
Sounds like a marvellous plan

Anyway good night everybody, I'm feeling a little poorly
And think I will need to self isolate now
As you should to - everybody Bog Off and go home!

COVID 11 -The doctor

I am a doctor doing my rounds
On the Corona virus ground
In the infectious diseases ward
Its early morning when I get there
I smile and say hello to the cleaner
They have been keeping hygiene at a premium
I ask her are you afraid at all,
She leans against a wall
And says I have a job to do its all the same
We are all in this together, the managers can deal
With every eventuality
Then she just picks up her mop, gets on with her job,
And then she stops, and says I mean, I do this for my family

I walk into the staff room where the nurses are chatting
There is a buzz of excitement as they hear the news
There is another announcement, by the Minister for Health
In the government
We are going to give the NHS all the help it needs, he says
What with the ventilators, the face masks, we are facilitators
We're going to curb the impact on hospitals
Yes there will be a rise in cases, its up two hundred two days later
Now everyone must stay in side

The staff they all look hopeful, and they think
The ward will cope when full, but remember days
Under foreign skies, and the jubilance will be gone
I predict in two weeks to come, by which time
We will be believe no more politicians lies

Already the hospital has ordered masks from the government
And ventilators are being put on trial,
But I have little faith in official promises
I need real world solutions, if they are going to bring them
Let it be now
Already patients are dying, and carriers are crying
Our nurses are fighting on the frontline
And where is their protection
Ok we are used to working with infection
But we see the most severe cases then go back to our home lives
Where our partners are home looking after the children
Because they are off from school
But I don't know if I'm infecting them all
Just the same
There needs to be more rigorous testing
And for people to keep in isolation
Only then it seems we will stand a chance to stay alive

While I wash my hands I count the seconds sing the song twice - Happy Birthday
Well I prefer Gloria Gaynor's version I will survive

COVID 10 - The Child

I am a kid and I'm staying indoors
I'm gonna leap on the furniture and slide on the floors
I will climb up the curtains and scale my bunk
And eat what I like while I watch any old junk
On television screens that make my eyes bulge
Like my sister and brother we're going to indulge
Oh the pleasures of life when you're away from school
I imagined I might live without any rule
But with my father I fight, and with my brother I brawl
And my sister shows me spite, while my mother she is cruel
Oh what have I done to deserve a family like these
I'd rather take flight be on a ship on rough seas
There is one for your money, and two for your looks
And I can get no honey with my head buried in books
But I can't go out, no I don't meet my friends
And its a longtime to stay stout, when will these tortures end?