What Paradise Have We Lost? (Real Talk Edition)
Think about it, would we have Dickens without child labour?
What a world when the youth of Bangladesh, or say, Ghana
Are no longer doing graveyard shifts in the textile factory
Or planting yams and pineapples in the hills of Aburi
Call me a contrarian Scrooge or a prematurely old codger
Our modern day Oliver Twists, Little Annies and Artful Dodgers
Coddled as they are with this modernity,
no longer have the hard knock life
My own childhood, despite my parents' challenges,
was blissfully free from strife
Kids these days have school, not farms and, get this,
activities for enrichment
Moreover they now constantly demand
fondleslabs of mobile entertainment
What about the old toys: stick, ball, string, dirt and box?
Is it nostalgia to ask, what paradise have we lost?
...
Gee kindly Doctor Fauci
Food banks can hardly be the response
To this covidious misery
Starving children don't cry
Tears waste too many calories
No, the kids are not alright
Parking lot wifi out of sight
True, man cannot live on bread alone
But surely you can find some crumbs to loan
Children, a Playlist
A soundtrack for his note. (spotify version)
- Children by Burning Spear
- Save the Children by Marvin Gaye
- Jesus Children of America by Stevie Wonder
- Children of the Sun by Courtney Pine
- African Children by The Heptones
- Children under the Sun by Israel Vibration
- Teach the Children by Eric B & Rakim
- The Kid from Red Bank by Count Basie
- Star Children by The Mighty Ryeders
- Ballad for the Children by Roy Hargrove
- Marcus Children Suffer by Burning Spear
Ending as we started with Burning Spear's words of wisdom.
This rumination on kids these days is part of a series: In a covidious time.
File under: humour, absurd, culture, observation, satire, modernity, youth, change, life, parenting, poetry, covidious, toli
Writing log: March 15, 2021
No comments:
Post a Comment