2787 - Tickly cough

Do aliens live out there in Saturn's rings
Or on its moons where oceans lie beneath
Or how 'bout one of those disks orbiting
The giant red-eyed Jupiter, it's breath
Perhaps warming those icy spheres where death
Is larger than life, as it mostly is
Apart from here on this blue planet Earth
Where every nook, every peak's touched by us
Directly with grubby greedy fingers
Or indirectly by the poisoning
Half-human wind that's now polluting both
The thing we don't value, the wilderness
And the thing we do, ourselves, and as spring
Heats up the sour air, we gasp for breath

2502 - Some people

Some people are just friendly, some are not
I can't be bothered if they're not, but I
Am forgiving if they change, I know what
A strain it can be to be friendly, why
Though, who knows, since it seems better to try
To get on than hop off the old love train
And fall prey to fear and suspicion, spy
Rather than engage, rather than use brain
Or empathy, out of the cocoon strain
As if we should all be the same, then plot
How to isolate the reject, bye bye
Happiness for the individual, fry
All your eggs in one pan, just one basket
Of humanity, caskets where dead souls lie

2361 - Two pints of lager and a Nazi salute, please

I'm being naughty, eating pork crackles
But I'll cook a meal later on tonight
There may well be European football
On TV, Spurs in France - there was a fight
Last night when fascists did Nazi salutes
Then attacked a pub in Lyon where fans
(Some may have been Jewish) held football chat
And pints in their football-supporting hands
Is this really still happening in France?
It happened to Spurs fans in Rome not all
That long ago (November), so it's quite
The trend, it seems. And by coincidence
Today downstairs at the Palace Hotel
Our diversity conference was alright

2311 - Machine gun

Coffee, TV, washing machine, flat, world
Consciousness, eyes, skin, hair, lungs, heart, liver
News, death but not birth, hate not love, it's old
But new to each unknown new-born seer
The forgotten have forgot they were here
They lost out being first, there was less then
Now there's too much, will cost the next lot dear
The difference between computer and pen
Technology has outstripped the human
It's smarter than its users and its world
But it still needs its users to give a
Breath of real life, a breath full of poison
Garbage in, garbage out, plug can't be pulled
Machines are our slaves, driving us faster

1769 - Full English

When faced with life's ups and its many downs
We all end up doing the best we can
Though on others' faces and on our own
Are many frowns, as things don't go to plan
We jump out of the fire into the pan
Like we're Mexican jumping sausages
We roll around and get all burnt again
By Fry-day we're well done and need a rest
The week's events can be hard to digest
But it's the same in all cities and towns
We all end up doing the best we can
Though some bests are poor, and others are best
There's equal credit should be passed around
Since everybody does the best they can
Sat 9 July

1710 - Cities - where are they now?

1710 was the year old Peking
Outgrew Istanbul as largest city
If this is true it shows that I'm learning
New things each day of great interest to me
We Europeans always assume we
Had the largest cities, though no longer
We feel we invented urbanity
But Uruk, in Iraq, is far older
Uruk's probably what Iraq's named after
Mesopotamia saw the first building
On a large scale. Now Mexico City
Beijing (still) Tokyo, Lagos, Jakarta
Are among the largest, and still growing
... and Seoul, and Lagos, Sao Paulo, Delhi...