Attrition Curve

Voluntary separation
Consider it an opportunity
If it fits with your plans
Might as well take the money

Take the offer, for sure, it's a tough call
For, who knows, the next time will be involuntary
It isn't pretty, you know, when the ax falls
Firings, unemployment, turmoil, redundancies

Take the buyout, it's relatively generous too
Just surprising that they'd pay you to leave
Pitching it as early retirement or the chance for something new
Ignoring entirely all the tales they were spinning just last week

To their credit, they aren't handling it like others in the industry
The fashion of layoffs is catching, albeit their choices are arbitrary
Impersonal, the casual cruelty of what they call restructuring activities
But no doubt it still hurts to have them talk of performance calibration
Empty phrases: managing the attrition curve, structural costs reduction

Voluntary Separation, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify)

• Buyout by The Floozies
• Can't Afford You Mad Cobra
• All I Have to offer you (is me) by Charley Pride
• Buyout by Esham
  Imagining what one would do with the proceeds of the Chrysler buyout. Cautionary tales have their own soundtrack
• Your Mess by Omar
• I'm a Mess by Anthony Hamilton
• Dog Days are Over by Florence and the Machine
• All Good Things (Come to an End) by Nelly Furtado
• Unexpected Things by Hohzo
• Severance by Street Fever

Bonus beats Get Rid Ah Dem by Sizzla

...

Previously, in the same vein:

• Restructuring Activities
• A Resource Action
• Workforce Rebalancing
• A Message from our Leader
• Involuntary Termination

File under: language, bureaucracy, work, economics, corporation, culture, job, USA, observation, poetry, perception, capitalism, humour, satire, The Rough Beast, toli

Writing log: May 12, 2023

Free-For-All

It was a question of nerve
  and, when it came down to it, the Wan blinked first
After their scribes threw in the towel,
  they succumbed to humanity's curse
In a moment, it seemed, they upended all their previous mitigations
Pivoting to the new normal, they said, they lifted all restrictions

That it was time to return to normalcy was the considered feeling
Truth be told, there was, in this, a large element of wishful thinking
And the evidence was clear, they'd been inadequate with this change of plans
The toll quickly showed they'd chosen a lower tier of soul insurance

For, beyond emotional vaccination, one needed inoculation effectiveness
Herd immunity was indeed a chimera,
  for now the whole land was a mess
It was every man for themselves, whiplash throughout the populace
Who would bear the heavy burden of the good scribes's mistakes

The historians would later ask, did they consider the alternatives?
The way these academics do, making hay at length about what ifs
They could have at least waited until after their lunar new year
What did they gain by so precipitously succumbing to fear?

And the optics weren't good, the whole world would be disbelieving
Any statistics now profferred would be taken as those Wan deceiving
All we know was that they were finally going through their second wave
Although, with the kind of numbers affected,
  fortune would only favor the brave

Hastily abandoned, previous certainties were now summarily dismissed
Yet saving face meant that no one could admit that anything was amiss
A confusion of discarded policies that were no longer compelling
The official silence that reigned in those ghastly few months was telling

Leveling up - or down as the case really proved to be
Now there was no sanctuary on hand for the catastrophe
The whole world placed as it were in the thick of it
Global narrative collapse with its striking deficits

Ananse hankered down with his family,
  best to keep quiet and watch what would unfold
In the aftermath, there would be more opportunity,
  of this he didn't need to be told
The Wan, it seemed, had calculated
 and decided on what amounted to acceptable loss
As the old proverb went: one cannot separate fighting horses with millet stalks

Weary times would follow, the toll of those days was rather harrowing
When all around everyone in the grip of the gods' cauldron was suffering
Ananse beheld so many that were complaining of these significations and wonders
Perplexing given that they'd had the opportunity to prevent the earlier blunders

It was the inconvenience that was the prime bone of contention
The notion that it was no longer worth favoring prevention
The change of policy had scuppered any goodwill, crossing the spider
He never forgot a grudge,
 in good time they would have something to remember

And so zero tolerance would be a thing of the past
It was surely inevitable that they couldn't hold fast
Now that caution was foregone, in its place came laissez faire
We would have no more examples of humanity's strategic savoir faire

The last sanctuary, then, swiftly descended into upheaval
A return to the worst of plague living, echoes of the medieval
The Gods had put all to the test, even those without the wherewithal
And with no place to hide on earth. We would all face this free-for-all

Free For All, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Free For All by Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers
• Every Man For Himself by Coleman Hawkins
• Upside Down by Diana Ross
• Topsy Turvy by Earl Hines
• No Rules by Trini Baby & Robelto
• Topsy Turvy by Bud Powell
• Back at One by Brian McKnight

See previously: Shakedown

File under: humour, satire, culture, observation, folktale, Ananse, storytelling, whimsy, myth, coronavirus, pandemic, Social Living, Things Fall Apart, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, hatchet job, covidious, poetry, toli

Writing log: May 27, 2023

Drone Operator

20/20 vision is a minimum, the requirement is nigh perfect eyesight
Also an ability to forget mistakes, perfection is a matter of hindsight
Twitchy sharp reactions, prior experience required with video games
Competitive and driven, a team player who is willing to inflict pain

The best candidates are baby faced, call them bloodless assassins
On-the-job training provides numerous opportunities to crash weddings
With major flexibility in working hours, you can embrace the impromptu
And enforce the home truth: "Visit America before America visits you"

A tapestry of pixels pored over for distinctive signals
A keen test of reflexes as you launch the predator missile
GPS-directed, with spotter verification to paint the target
Like the Brimstone missile, the system is designed for "fire-and-forget"

Working at a remove from the ground action
Remote control, pushing buttons with abandon
The bearer holds to the belief in things unseen
Detachment of spirit, signature strikes, this is the American dream

Classified findings laid out the executive decrees
Gave the benefit of the shadows, the veil of secrecy
Thus protected by covering memos providing limited liability
A free reign, then, to sow the seeds of excess mortality

Someone who takes pride in their tools, a skilled master
Nicknamed their vessel the mobile widow maker
An early recruit, adept at the drudge of targeted killing
Televised slaughter, quiet as it's kept, can be so thrilling

Yet it's not all fun and games, even with precision munition
This daily front seat, private viewing of target acquisition
Spheres of influence, inventive vehicle for force projection
Delivery platform, artisanal even, for heat-seeking execution

Gamer heroes
Beast mode
Player ratings
Cheat codes

The new warfare, defense authorization for collateral damage
Our benefits package leaves you anesthetized from the foreign carnage
Sharp maneuvers, joystick exertions that satisfy
Pax Americana, raining vengeance out of the sky

Top Secret. The role calls for security clearance with polygraph
Mentoring skills are sought after, you'll be managing junior staff
Pinpoint expertise wrought from a distance while wearing a headset
An exciting workplace, with only the occasional regret

Burn out is a possibility, but is cast as acceptable loss
For this kind of wet work, even at a remove, has its costs
Conscience optional, foot soldier of the war on terror
The clean and delicate hands of the drone operator

Drone Operator, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Remote Control by Loose Ends
• Out of the sky by Van Hunt
• Cold Blooded by Rick James
• I've Committed Murder by Macy Gray
• Cold Blooded by Common
• Remote Control by Beastie Boys
• Cold Blooded by Gary Clark Jr.
• From a Distance by Bette Midler
• Kill Screen by Shadow Shadow
• Automaton by Jamiroquai
• Drone Operator's Lament by Radarcave

Bonus beats albeit very destabilizing: The Loneliness of the Long Distance Killer by The Meteors

File under: humour, satire, hatchet job, blood, war, alienation, modernity, USA, politics, culture, outrage, observation, perception, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: December 18, 2022

Shakedown (Part π Pay the Piper)

A new variant by any other name, this one came in many disguises
The claims adjuster decided that naming it Pi was not needed for this crisis
Let things evolve independently, trust in the process of natural selection
Buyer beware, humanity had been given fair warning about the threat of mutations

Thus he released a swarm of new ailments, troubling in their variety
Escape artists altogether adept at evading mitigations in their entirety
Cerberus, Centaurus, Hydra, the nicknames were telling for this pressure group
A cloud of stealthy lineages with growth advantages, some called them grief soup

Unlike the angels, the claims adjuster was not possessed with a rhadamanthine spirit
A pragmatic sort, he considered all arguments he beheld strictly on their merits
He was not averse to give and take, he would agree to reasonable accommodation
The caveat in his dealings was that he could not tolerate duty abrogation

He heard the elevator pitches from the delegates of the Ushers
Rather full of pretension, they had aspirations of grandeur
Some griots might label their posturing as akin to erstwhile Pharisees
When, at heart all that drove them was the profit motive and its sanctity

The law was for their friends, often irrelevant, and applied selectively
But, when it came to their enemies, they expected strict severity
Onerous, they loaded their side of the scale, the contest was unequal
Yet, by their rhetoric, they were worthy victors, men of the people

Justice from their point of view was merely a gesture
To be ignored in the heat of the deal at their leisure
Enamored of exclusivity, they wanted the lion's share of the pie
Indeed, theirs was a policy towards others of default deny

Inscrutable obstacles they erected, what mattered was who paid the piper
Impenetrable defenses, secret codes that were impossible to decipher
Poised between despair and folly, it was the reign of the incurious
A sad state of affairs when ignorance was the prevailing consensus

...

Third time's the charm, Ananse decided to let his comperes lead the delegation
There was no need, with these careless Ushers, for a personal intervention
Sika, with her actuarial prowess, essentially promised an investment safe harbor
The chief linguist and head scribe plainly assumed that everything was in order

They hadn't realized that their old playbook had been rendered obsolete
Without a reappraisal, they were well and truly heading for defeat
Concerted action, and, most of all, cooperation, was what was needed
But alas, short-sightedness meant that a decisive response was impeded

Shakedown, the Ushers hadn't realized they'd been placed in a straitjacket
For Ananse had devised the ultimate shell game, a kind of protection racket
And by playing them off the gods and the claims adjuster with his mystic brew
He wouldn't even need to seek to hustle the other tribes for further revenue

...

Out of Agona always something new went the old saying
Life in the torrid zone was brutish, harsh and often dismaying
But constraints and necessity seemed to foster invention
Moreover they accepted the value of an ounce of prevention

They'd had to keep their heads down throughout the crisis
Having meager rations of even the most basic prophylaxis
Luckily their old ways, living mostly outdoors, conferred a few advantages
But as normalcy was reasserted they would slowly lose those temporary privileges

They realized they had a long journey ahead but now had better examples
Eyes open, they'd seen what the Wan tribe could achieve by being sensible
That flashy appeals, seductive as they may have been, were no substitute for planning
That by staying the course they could perhaps leapfrog development and continue advancing

...

And so back to the Ushers, Dear Reader,
  how would they handle the weight?
Truth be told, it was only on the matter of form
 that there was a little debate
Since their herd immunity was to shame, they were hardly blameless
The claims adjuster was under no obligation to make things painless

Nyame observed their insatiable appetites,
 incorrigible, they continued to misbehave
Altogether irrational behavior,
 they would soon look back fondly on the second wave
The gathering storm was on hand
 and there was a clear deficit of disaster relief
The tale of the lost stories,
 they'd now have to abide with the laws of grief

The tipping point was the specter of the looming claims adjuster
Which impressed on the majority how close they had come to disaster
A bitter lesson learned, they would be consigned to internal displacement
For not having heeded the warning: greed always brings its own punishment

Shakedown, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Shake you Down by Gregory Abbott
• People get Ready by Brand New Heavies
• Risin' to the Top by Keni Burke
• Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground) by The Jacksons
• Let's Get Back to Love by Loose Ends
• Shakedown by Brand New Heavies
• Your Mess by Omar
• (If You Ain't) Comfortable by Lynden David Hall
• Soul Shakedown Party by Bob Marley
• Shake Down Blues by Blind Boy Fuller
• Shake Down by Evelyn "Champagne" King

See previously Shakedown Part 1, Protection Racket Part 2 and A Modern Bestiary Part 3


The Soul Insurance suite of folktales:

• Soul Insurance
• Buyer's Remorse
• Shakedown

File under: humour, satire, culture, observation, folktale, Ananse, storytelling, whimsy, myth, coronavirus, pandemic, Social Living, Things Fall Apart, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, hatchet job, covidious, poetry, toli

Writing log. October 9, 2022

Shakedown (Part III A Modern Bestiary)

Everything is local but, for once, the tables were turned
A global calamity, a clear opportunity for lessons to be learned
The shakedown had clarified a taxonomy of optimists and pessimists
A hierarchy of outlooks astride the great game of power and politics

Some put their faith in the state, the competence of the chiefs was unquestioned
A matter of organization, for their high priesthood, of rules and regulations
Call them optimists, the power of the collective was their proving ground
Leading by example, with a touch of advocacy, the rest would come around

Their leading lights lived mainly in the environs of Chwedru, to the east
The Wan tribe had a strict policy of zero tolerance for social diseases
Clear-eyed about the efficacy of doctrine, and serious, they brooked no loose ends
A coterie of technocrats at heart bent on engineering the right dividends

The other side of the coin, protectionist by nature, craved independence
Closed borders, crass provincialism, the very antithesis of openness
Nationalists of a sort, touting the virtues of self-sufficiency
Fatalistic opinions, a dim view of the prospects for humanity

Still, never let a crisis go to waste, it was a buying opportunity
This foundational insight lay at the very heart of their identity
Caricatured as common vultures, feasting on the carrion of catastrophe
Danger lay everywhere, only the paranoid survived latent vulnerability

These others, Ushers mostly, believed strongly that it was every man for himself
Effective cooperation was a pipe dream, they thought, it simply couldn't be helped
They would always make the best of a bad situation
Seeking every advantage to enhance their position

All of the three tribes of humanity were afflicted with disaster capitalists
It seemed quite clear that there was an influential cohort of catastrophists
Who would squeeze the lifeblood, the very essence, at every opportunity
The last gasps were their rightful due, profits, the fruits of inequality

Black gold to extract, fodder for crown jewels
They believed in the reign of the righteous few
Going by past evidence, they were certain that their position would be strengthened
Indeed the tensions of the present moment rather heightened the contradictions

Armed with trickle down bromides out of the mouth of juju tricksters
Dispensing sweet lies, the opiates of the masses, voodoo elixirs
With marketing prowess in abundance, masters of the art of the deal
Those rubes in the torrid zone would surely succumb to their appeal

And even the less cynical thought that a technological fix was in order
The medicine men and the panoply of scribes would surely find a panacea
And even if the notion of herd immunity had proved to be a chimera
The lesson was clear: error is a poor friend but an excellent teacher

The stage was set, the afflictions of the gods had raised a challenge
Would humanity, in the face of such different postures, be able to manage?
Between those who expected fundamental change and even better days ahead
Or those who were bent on consolidation amidst social upheaval instead

Shakedown, jostling for power, a radical restructuring
Which way would the tribes go in the face of this testing?
The challenge had been raised, now it was down to performance
Those who seemed best prepared had paid their soul insurance

Shakedown, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

See previously Shakedown Part 1 and Protection Racket Part 2

Next in Part π Pressure Group, new variants on the horizon


File under: humour, satire, culture, observation, folktale, Ananse, storytelling, whimsy, myth, coronavirus, pandemic, Social Living, Things Fall Apart, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, hatchet job, covidious, poetry, toli

Writing log. October 7, 2022

Shakedown (Part II Protection Racket)

Ananse was a folk etymologist at heart, a man of the people
The spider kept his ear to the ground as he considered the sequel
What glorious phrase would future scribes use to coin his next endeavor?
How to top his previous mischief and count the ways in which he was clever

Shakedown - rather than a search, a process or a period of adjustment
The definition of shakedown that he preferred was readily apparent
He'd done it repeatedly, the squeeze plays of yore had come to fruition
Yes indeed, he was ready to embark on another instance of subtle extortion

He recalled that the chief linguist of the Ushers was a man of few principles
Indeed, he'd tried to cut him out of the earlier deal, the dirty rotten scoundrel
Functional defenestration was the prospect now that his red lines had been crossed
For a toothless dog contents itself with licking the bones it is tossed

Never one to forget a slight, he resolved to press ahead with his approach
He would emphasize that his no pressure tactics were beyond reproach
Add a sweetener, mention that his policies came with an extended warranty
Throw in a no fault clause or even, if need be, a money back guarantee

Along with Sika the actuary, he prepared the shape of the package
Not that he expected them to do due diligence, that he could manage
No, the threat raised of the claims adjuster's wrath would be the stern stick
Their thoughtful words, honeyed at that, would be the carrot that would mislead

This had all the makings of the ultimate protection racket
For the Ushers had painted themselves as an attractive target
Preparation was all, he would engage every option as a backup plan
Fifi, that young wastrel, duly suborned, would be his inside man

Of course, he would structure the transaction with opaque layers
They would be unable to perceive the extent of their betrayal
By the time they would discover the deception, it would be too late
And the mortification at their now-obvious failure would be great

Ananse was mindful of the old proverb that explained it best
Namely that when a farmer is clearing a path in the forest,
It is only somebody else who stands behind them - and this was the insight
Who can actually tell that the path is veering to the left or the right

With sleight of hand, misdirection and other elements of deceit
What they believed was immaterial, what mattered was their conceit
Such were the main tricks of the trade, along with a touch of hyperbole
All of which worked to confound, relying on the inability to properly see

If indeed beauty and greed lay in the eye of the beholder
Ananse held that blindness and conceit were the prey of the deceiver
While it was said that the best cons were elegantly wrought
Experience taught that you should always check what you bought

Shakedown, then, the lynchpin of Ananse's strategy
Shakedown, mindful of humanity's peculiarities
Shake down and see who is ultimately left standing
Shake them down, they were headed for a hard landing

The Ushers fancied themself sophisticates and rugged individualists
Unable to consider the collective, they simply ignored systemic risk
A disastrous posture when the gods were set on testing their mettle
Force majeure, market turmoil would reveal the extent of the bezzle

Shakedown, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)


See previously Shakedown Part 1

Next in Part 3 A Bestiary of Sorts

File under: humour, satire, culture, observation, folktale, Ananse, storytelling, whimsy, myth, coronavirus, pandemic, Social Living, Things Fall Apart, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, hatchet job, covidious, poetry, toli

Writing log. October 6, 2022

Shakedown

To the gods, the evidence was clear, if not incontrovertible
That humanity had decided to forgo the mosquito principle
For their appetites were proving to be, as advertised, insatiable
They were content to accept losses that were once said to be incalculable

Without skipping a beat, some had even returned to their violent ways
Unable to suppress their pathologies, they had been counting the days
Lining up conquests to embark on and making blunt threats of annexation
The specter of grievous calamity, they roundly dismissed as mere vexation

The poisoned chalice of free will was such that you could choose to be insane
But after a fair warning, the punishment due was the application of pain
By this stage, the claims adjuster was well practiced so he remained patient
After all, enforcing the gods' will was only a matter of launching a new variant

Still it was rather puzzling, the situation that humanity faced
The nature of their hubris, the bravado and confidence misplaced
Rather than accept the lessons of the global pause and embrace solidarity
Their vision of the new world order was strictly limited to the pecuniary

The commercial among them had taken extreme measures to preserve their interests
The profit imperative had blinded them to sense and made them thoroughly reckless
Business never personal, went their mantra, easy money, unearned rents
The prospect of a hard day's work for them was simply without precedent

As to the gods, the minds of Nyame and Nyankopon were firmly set on a shakedown
To place humanity under continued scrutiny, a kind of metaphorical lockdown
A thoroughgoing investigation of their tendency to be reckless
What central bankers in these modern times might call a stress test

Odomankoma and Asase Yaa, on this matter, were more tolerant and considerate
Laissez faire by inclination, theirs was a light touch take on this debate
Willing to cut humanity a little slack so long as they didn't make a fuss
And even more if they made good faith efforts to protect the least of us

And one could point to a few signs of realignment
The picture was mixed, it was not all disappointment
One heard in parts of some amount of forbearance
Cutting through perhaps, the lessons of soul insurance

But there were limits, and these turned on matters of integrity
It wouldn't do to allow rank sin and iniquity
Agency was one thing but it was hard to abide hypocrisy
After all, the phrase did have meaning: excessive liability

Nyame took the lead in enforcement and made to summon the claims adjuster
This last reassured the god that plans were well advanced for humanity's next chapter
Indeed before long they'd be cast as stars of modern day horror stories
Staffing shortages and supply chain snafus would be the least of their worries

Still, Nyame reiterated that due process must be followed
Nyankopon added that the social fabric need not be hollowed
That lip service be paid to probity in as much as could be managed
Although the response from the gods must, of necessity, be seen to be savage

The claims adjuster agreed that it was time to put his foot down
And set about to put into high gear the plans for the shakedown
Serendipity, as far as variants went, he'd now reached the magic number
Pi, archaic though it may be, it would give them something to remember

Shakedown, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Shake you Down by Gregory Abbott
• People get Ready by Brand New Heavies
• Risin' to the Top by Keni Burke
• Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground) by The Jacksons
• Let's Get Back to Love by Loose Ends
• Shakedown by Brand New Heavies
• Your Mess by Omar
• (If You Ain't) Comfortable by Lynden David Hall
• Soul Shakedown Party by Bob Marley
• Shake Down Blues by Blind Boy Fuller
• Shake Down by Evelyn "Champagne" King

Next in Part II Protection Racket, Ananse seeks easy profits and Part III A Modern Bestiary, a book of beasts.

See the previous covidious folktales: Soul Insurance and Buyer's Remorse

File under: humour, satire, culture, observation, folktale, Ananse, storytelling, whimsy, myth, coronavirus, pandemic, Social Living, Things Fall Apart, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, hatchet job, covidious, poetry, toli

Writing log. October 5, 2022

Field of Light

"While I appreciate art, I fail to see how using 28,000 spheres, no matter how subtly lit, showcases an intersection with nature..."

— Wildflower Center Fails its Conservation Mission by Lighting Up its Landscape (Austin Chronicle, September 23, 2022)

J'accuse. Subtle lighting is no panacea
This really takes the cake, you must have no concern for nature
The ramifications of the act are serious, this is no laughing matter

Let me tell you, wrapping up a disaster, ignoring harmful effects
I'll bet that you haven't even consulted the experts
Light pollution is real, my friends, why don't you think about the birds


...

"Our goal, with any installation, is to be thoughtful and considerate of the landscape, as well as the topography, and wildlife."

— FAQs - Bruce Munro's Field of Light Comes to The Wildflower Center

And now for the rejoinder, the frequently asked questions
The artist composes a deft environmental impact statement
The obligatory show of commitment, for the field of light is sustainable

A celebration of natural topography, the stated goal is to be thoughtful
Materials highly recyclable, light sources for charitable installations
Solar powered and very durable, the aim is reuse without loss of condition


...

Art is not for everyone as the field of lights exhibit illuminates
For what to the eye of the beholder may thrill and exhilarate
May leave a mark of indifference to others or even infuriate
The thought occurs: what we have here is a failure to appreciate

Field of Light, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Light my fire by Minnie Riperton
• Turn your lights down low by Bob Marley & the Wailers
• The light by Common
• Blinded by the light by Manfred Mann's Earth Band
• Turn off the lights by Teddy Pendergrass
• Blinded by the light by The Freedub Press
• Into the light by Prince
• Bright lights by Matchbox Twenty
• Blinding lights by Victoria Voss
• Bright lights by Gary Clark Jr
• Blinding lights by The Weeknd
• Lights by Ellie Goulding
• Bright lights by Cannons
• Light my fire by Massive Attack

You can't please everyone

File under: humour, hatchet job, satire, culture, observation, art, appreciation, perception, environment, modernity, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log. October 7, 2022

Giant Checks

"The Prime Minister then handed out giant checks to the bereaved
A sign, he said, that the state would take care of those who have lost so much"

— Thailand nursery attack (BBC report, October 7, 2022)

Giant checks, devoid of meaning
Thoughts and prayers, the theater of grief
A parade of penance and ritual tributes

Giant checks, post-facto regret
Consolation payments, the language of impotence
The wages of acceptable loss

Giant checks, base calculations of uniformed men
Seasoned with blood, whither the monopoly of violence?
Witness the performance of authority

Giant checks to the bereaved, a duty of care
Not to mention the provision of little urns and coffins
A fine display, the toll unbearable, the final indignities

Giant checks, props for a national calamity
The sobbing and shrieks, a symphony of despair
An unending stillness in others, more worrying are these vacant stares

Giant checks, empty gestures
Roused by tragedy, the coup maker's show of concern
Balm for communal numbness

Giant checks, strictly by the numbers
Effigies erected to solace, pain underwritten in large print
Sorrow in sans-serif and block letters

Giant checks disbursed in the aftermath of death
Survivor's guilt by way of comfort and healing
Mandatory compensation for those still breathing

Giant checks, lottery winners
A failure to protect, pageantry in the wake of slaughter
This too could happen to you

Giant Checks, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Check out your Mind by Curtis Mayfield
• King of Sorrow by Sade
• Can't buy me by Femi Kuti
• Sorrow, Tears and Blood by Fela Kuti
• Meaningless Money by Kuber Bhaskar
• Sorrow doesn't Resurrect by Ark Patrol

Bonus beats: Sorry ain't enough by Sault

See previously: Ritual Tributes and Action Items

File under: language, hatchet job, outrage, satire, violence, blood, theatre, Thailand, military, crime, humour, culture, observation, perception, grief, mourning, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, poetry, toli

Writing log. October 7, 2022

Very Reverend

Holier than thou, words like uplift and sanctify
Fingertips outstretched and touching, mist in the eye
Apt at any stage to tear up, so caught up, as he is, with devotion
He takes a few moments to collect himself, overcome with emotion

A full plate of sanctimony embodied in his very person
The righteous testimony he shares, those enduring lessons
The earnestness of his commitment cannot be denied
That apt word again resurfaces: he is sanctified

White handkerchief out, he mops his brow when in a state of beatitude
In a trance, or is it a rapture, the care of his religious attitude
The justness of his cause goes without saying, the certitude
Be thankful for what we've got from the most high, the gratitude

Praise be, he's ever prone to alliteration
Acceptance, adjudication, alacrity, anticipation
Sanctity, sacraments, sanctuary, salutations
Concern, contemplation, corruptions, conjugation

Still, you'll note a deliberateness to his every utterance
The obvious corollary to the seriousness of his countenance
A curious otherness even with the pose of the man of the people
For it is clear that in God's presence every sinner is equal

"We stand here, pious servants, on these hallowed grounds
We greet the occasion with keen reflection and sober sounds
Look no further, my brethren, as we embrace the promises of healing"
Said as if he was the sole one in this audience in touch with his feelings

Authoritative in demeanor, keywords: calm and steady
Serenity now, humorless yet always a smile at the ready
Judge not however, he'll shower you with grace, blessings and kindness
But do know he'll never let you forget that you're in the presence of holiness

Small mercies and hosannas, a focus on morning glories
The full suite of values imparted in his salutary stories
The Very Reverend - get the title right, this righteous teacher
Don't ever mistake him for your garden variety preacher

Preacher, a playlist

I'm a little conflicted about the soundtrack for this note, the long piece I've been mulling on a country preacher was diverted into this hatchet job on a Very Reverend One. Pardon the imprecision, but I can't pass up an opportunity to share a playlist with Cannonball and Jimmy Smith. (spotify version)

• Country Preacher by Cannonball Adderley Quintet
• The Sermon by Jimmy Smith
• The Preacher by Horace Silver & the Jazz Messengers
• The Love Sermon by Al Green
• Wallk Tall by Cannonball Adderley Quintet
• The Preacher by Jimmy Smith

Bonus beats: The Preacher's Tune by Jimmy Mcgriff and two versions of Son of a Preacher Man by Dusty Springfield and Aretha Franklin

File under: humour, satire, hatchet job, culture, observation, perception, shell game, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: September 9, 2022

Drop, Chain and Accordion

Harbingers of malnutrition
The Four Horsemen of hunger season
While the first three duly entered our vocabulary
The fourth, left to shame, was pushed to the recesses of memory

The drop was the most embarrasing of these musketeers
Because, when first encountered, he caught you unawares
The sudden drop of your clothing - you were now half your size
Exposing your nether regions to the fresh air and curious eyes

By the time you got to the chain or the accordion, you'd find yourself spent
Having long made your peace with this state of affairs: eternal Lent
Accustomed as you were to - call it by its name, starvation
After all, you were living through a proper People's Revolution

Marking the spot on your belt where you would pierce the extra notch
Or wearing belts where you previously had none - acceptable loss
Improvised contraptions for your skirts and trousers hopefully holding
Under military rule, we were at a remove from skirt-and-blouse voting

The second horseman, the chain, spoke to tears and sorrow
A cynical description of a neckline that was now hollow
Jewelry of a sort, a macabre, if fashionable, decoration
Thriftiness embodied in your very person, a celebration

The third horseman, the equal opportunity composer, the accordion
Orchestrated skinny rib cages visibly appealing to both old and young
A skeletal music of fatigue, unmet needs and quiet exhaustion
He devised a twelve bar blues, if you will, of quotidian suffering

As to the fourth, rickety, he mainly dealt with little children
Confounding in his physicality as should be readily apparent
Kwashiorkor, quite a mouthful, the dreadful disease
The characteristic bloating, the ironic mark of the beast

Weight loss, hair loss, failure to thrive, and apathy
And then we come to those now-distended extremities
And even with the outrage and the sense of violation
The question still remains, why were these men laughing?

Nature may be a cruel companion, what with droughts and brush fires
Yet it was a man-made disaster, preventable, and caused by these liars
With limited food resources, this had all the makings of a tragedy
Worse, they were warned well in advance at the time yet they carried on stubbornly

Quite bewildering though, and damaging to the psyche
To be branded as requiring all the world's charity
Stalking horses of hunger seasons past, harrowing and dubious legacies
Ancestral memories passed across the ages, fear and survival strategies

The fourth horseman, although it must be said, was rather solicitous,
Didn't lend himself to a coinage that was quite so felicitous
The lived experience was stark and dispiriting, disturbing in its dismay
Awful enough that even that angel Euphemism couldn't summon an uneasy phrase

Drop, chain and accordion, then, were the fateful entries
Albeit History gave unkind placement in the dictionaries
They would be prefixed in the lexicon by his name
To the Flight Lieutenant's great and everlasting shame

Such however is the way of privation, the nature of its exigency
That, even in the darkest hours, in the depths of an emergency
Gallows humor reigns, it calls forth linguistic innovation and whimsy
Proverbial zingers, sharp aphorisms, etched forever in memory

...

Basket cases
Tiny coffins
Circling vultures
Calmly watching

Weeping mothers
Hunger pangs
And the crowds
Scrambling for crumbs

...

Starving children don't cry
Tears waste too many calories
Shame, that so many had to die
Shame, again, their swollen bellies

Hunger, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Pearls by Sade
  Melodramatic as befits the tragic scene she describes, mournful this ode to wounded pride.
• Hungry Blues by Jimmy Johnson & His Orchestra
• Never Mind the Hungry Blues by Larry Carlton
• Got the Hunger by Alice Russell
• Them Belly Full (But We Hungry) by Bob Marley
• Man Hungry by Sugar Minot
• When Hungry Walks by Gregory Isaacs
• Hungry Belly Pickney by Freddie Macgregor
• Hungry Belly Dub by King Tubby
• Very, Very Hungry by Brian Eno & David Byrne
  An instrumental track from the experimental album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts

Bonus beats: Hungry Belly by Frankie Paul & Pinchers, mainly for the title for this is a story about girl from Flatbush named Aisha. And of course, three live versions of Sade's Pearls, a show stopper ever since she composed it.


...

After Hunger for Sale (Talking Drums, October 3, 1983)

And also for that friend who startled me with the vehemence of his reaction when I teased him about his short stature. "Some of us didn't have our growth spurt during those years, we had Rawlings chains instead". A brief, damning silence ensued before joviality made its return. With my vaunted exile meshed with his explicit denial, our friendship, perhaps, was salved by the balm of the musical imagery. But the bitterness lingered.

And if archeologists can detect the evidence of famines and stunted growth like tree rings, etched in human bones, linguists and social historians can similarly escavate matters. Both earthquakes and man-made disasters leave their marks. Dzorwulu becomes 'the place that dropped', the valley of urban remembrance. Drop, chain and accordion as pointed modes of resistance in our hunger season.

Poetry as cultural memory then. Coinages bear the tide marks of social distress. In any case, this one's for you.

See previously Identification Haircut and, retrospectively, AFRC Member

File under: humour, hatchet job, satire, culture, observation, perception, language, Ghana, Africa, coup, rogues, dictator, military, famine, disaster, failure, outrage, memory, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: September 18, 2022

Mercurial, They Call Him

Portrait of a narcissist, a few essential traits
A slight never forgotten, don't you make that mistake
A double heart filled with unspoken threats
He wears the mask the audience deserves

Portrait of an opportunist, moral flexibility in abundance
Reversals galore but he rolls with the punches
His interests always trump friendships, let's call it expedience
For survival beyond the day's end is his sole allegiance

Portrait of the vain, hollow on the inside
Entitlement in stiff competition with pride
His secret weapon, a genuine sense of self importance
Chock full of certainty about the rightness of his cause
To call him self centered is to merely state the obvious

Portrait of a deceiver, all things to all men
Lying with a straight face, his enduring strength
Pitch perfect delivery, you could swear he believes every untruth
Surely, to impugn the purity of his motives? What are you, uncouth?

Carried Fanon's book around for a full year - wretched
Still occasionally tries to read it (practice makes perfect)
But underneath everything is a fundamental insecurity
Mommy and Daddy issues, the bitter roots of his immaturity

The need for speed, horses his first love
But anything with an engine would do
Nights out with the running partners
Booze, the hard stuff, ladies of easy virtue
After dark, how exciting, and all in the same room

It's fair to say that there are multitudes inside of this man
Characterized, everyone says, by his tremendous charm
Unrestrained, unfiltered, half baked, half-cocked
Empty but empowered, half truths, half thought

Absolved, then, of the burden of any sense of responsibility
Free to be a political actor altogether allergic to empathy
A chameleon - mercurial, they call him, the luckiest man alive
Just your luck that you're stuck with him, the best years of your life

Bad, a playlist

For what it's worth, this playlist was intended to stand alone but seeing as I haven't written up the liner notes in the 17 years since I made it, I suppose I can repurpose it as the soundtrack for this note. A couple of hours on a bad man (spotify version)

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

...

See previously The Conqueror's Catechism


File under: humour, hatchet job, rogues, satire, culture, observation, perception, military, dictator, blood, sin, greed, gremlins, Africa, violence, strategy, Fallen Angels, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: September 18, 2022

Involuntary Termination

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For human resources professionals
Update your knowledge about redundancies
And learn about terminating employees safely

As the latest research has shown
The risks of a former employee filing discrimination charges
Increases significantly - and therein lies the danger,
After they are terminated involuntarily

Hence the importance of documentation
And having the right steps and procedures
When conducting disciplinary discussions
For a termination should be handled well

Active preparation makes good business sense
Writing and following a script to minimize legal risk
Helps you maintain employee morale and productivity
The benefits of effective termination practices

Involuntary Termination, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Hydra by Grover Washington Jnr
• Break it to me Gently by Angela Bofill
• Softly Softly by Sweetback ft Maxwell
• Break You Off by The Roots ft Musiq
• Break it to me Gently by Juice Newton

Previously, in the same vein:

• Restructuring Activities
• A Resource Action
• Workforce Rebalancing
• A Message from our Leader

File under: humour, satire, language, bureaucracy, work, economics, corporation, culture, job, USA, observation, poetry, perception, capitalism, The Rough Beast, toli

Writing log: September 22, 2022

This Fourth

This Fourth of July
Tariffs and a trade war
Inflation rising

Calls for regime change
The folly of wars of choice
The sound of bombs dropping

Rogues and damn scoundrels
Doing their worst, unrestrained
God bless America

But they got their tax cuts
And Supreme Court justices
The spoils of the feast

Big, beautiful bombs, then,
And bills signed in blood
And fraught with impunity

The half-life of dreams
Decay by design
A body drained of integrity

This Fourth, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note courtesy of Sault (spotify version)

• Glory
• Sorry ain't enough
• Why why why why why
• Warrior
• Living in America
• Fear no one
• Threats
• Valley of the ocean
• Free
• Wildfires
• God in disguise
• Masterpiece

Bonus beats: There will be no crying by Cleo Sol

...

The Strait of Hormuz
Motherhood and apple pie
Time for a ceasefire

...

No nation sinks to greater depths than when its government is obliged to listen silently to moral sermons preached by obvious scoundrels

— Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

See previously: A Very Beautiful Thing!, Facilitate, You Voted For This (And Other Songs), and An Abundance of Caution

File under: hatchet job, humour, satire, rogues, politics, USA, culture, observation, perception, values, displacement, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, poetry, toli

Writing log: June 23, 2025

An Abundance of Caution

What is there to say?
Security theater
Newspaper headlines:

- Mahmoud Khalil returns home after release on bail from federal detention after 104 days

- Pakistan to nominate Trump for Nobel Peace Prize

— The U.S. enters Israel's war against Iran

- "One Earth, One Health": International Yoga Day provides respite in a tumultuous world

- The U.S dropped bombs on three nuclear sites, President Trump said on social media

Congratulations to our great American Warriors.
There is not another military in the World that could have done this.
NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE!
Thank you for your attention to this matter

...

In the US, New York's police department says it is deploying additional resources to religious, cultural, and diplomatic sites across the city "out of an abundance of caution"

What is there to say, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Ishafan by Duke Ellington
• Redemption song by Bob Marley
• Reflection by Prince
• Peace piece by Bill Evans
• Jarabi by Toumani Diabaté

After this query

File under: language, huhudious, war, USA, hatchet job, rogues, Israel, Iran, power, politics, culture, observation, perception, humour, satire, Observers are worried, The Rough Beast, poetry, toli

Writing log: June 21, 2025

You Voted For This (And Other Songs)

Elections don't make for great subject matter for music (or art in general). They are typically uneventful in most countries. And most would rather sing about love, conflict, loss or betrayal. Audiences don't favor the banal when escapism, gossip, or spicy takes are available.

Still, there is a certain strain of art that emerges when elections are contentious, or if the personalities involved are striking in some way. The loss may hurt more, the win might be long overdue, or against all odds, the results might be shocking...

Joy, shock, upheaval or outrage rightly deserve an artistic response. In contrast, the poet of the quotidian lives in considered penury, envious of her more successful peers.

Hands down, the greatest artistic reaction to an election is B-movie by Gil Scott Heron. It starts with the immortal line "Mandate, my ass", and goes on from deconstructing Ronald Reagan's 1980 election to painting a pointillist portrait of a nostalgia-ridden USA (said nostalgia endures).

Beyond the biting poetry, set to that militaristic bassline, the performance benefits from its panoramic scope that moves beyond Skippy's loss, and RayGun's ascension, to a cold-eyed assessment of the wider culture.

(His band would soon be renamed the Selective Amnesia Express.)

The song, B-movie, like the earlier Winter in America, continues to resonate due to the range of his ambition and careful economy of the execution. The sparse musical arrangement is just the icing on the cake.

The prescient lyrics, of course, diagnosed, at length, Bush 2004 and Trump's MAGA appeal:

The idea concerns the fact that this country wants nostalgia
They want to go back as far as they can - even if it's only as far as last week
Not to face now or tomorrow, but to face backwards

But if B-movie is sui generis, what about the more routine reactions? Sticking to music and what is available on YouTube music, and focusing on the USA, I give you a representative playlist of twenty songs that cover the past twenty years. As usual, I have a few thoughts (call them liner notes)...

• You Voted For This, a playlist (YouTube, Spotify)

The most recent reaction songs started right after the November 2024 US election. The most typical response contains the expected mix of disgust, I told you so, you've made your bed, now lie in it, this is your mess etc. In short, schadenfreude, anger and fear prevail.

While I understand the impulse and there's certainly the urge to react, politics remains a contact sport. One wonders: what is the intent of all this sound and fury? What is the underlying theory of change?

Anger may motivate to wrath while disappointment often leads to depression and disengagement. Perhaps the idea is that even though writing in righteous anger, or singing the blues, may not change the world, their palliative relief is very welcome. Perhaps we should look elsewhere for change.

(But perhaps I'm not the wisest person to opine on such matters, after all I've written 5,000 words on an html button, 7,000 words on a taxonomy useful idiots, and even 9,000 words on a bookmarked tag. What change did I drive?)

Every act of creation should be celebrated. Moving on...

The most impressive finding comes from the aptly-named band, Friends of USAID. Newly-formed in 2025, they fully embrace the satirical mantle. Opening this playlist is the just-released I Voted For This. A delicate duo, melding male and female voices, they add sweet insult to injury

Calm delivery, sample lyrics:

My cousin's kid caught the measles - I guess that's kinda sad
But at least she won't have to learn how slavery was bad
The crops are dying, the aid is gone, but I don't care 'bout that
At least I don't have to speak Mexican and hear 'bout them eating cats

The inspired band name highlights the Doge cuts that have decimated the mission of the eponymous agency. The artwork of the 15 singles they have released this year accentuate the effect. As do the songs themselves sample titles: Thoughts and Prayers, inc, Reverse Robin Hood (The Tariff Two-Step).

I hope that, like Randy Rainbow, they commit to the bit and continue to release more music. They have an album's worth of material already. We could all do with more biting satire to leaven the next few years.

More typical in the 2025 crop is You Voted For This Fool by Lazy Radiographer which reeks with disgust. The chorus: "You chose the fire / Now feel the cost / Watch freedom burn / While you praise the boss"

This Is What You Voted For (I Hope You're Happy) by After Everything continues in the vein of anger and outrage. It's rock-infused so less restrained. Lyric: "Sooner or later they'll come for you and you'll be the next in line". Bleach is the cover of their last album title A-Jax Everywhere

Is This What You Voted For? by Rhett Sawyer is more earnest and conciliatory, seeking to question and start a conversation. He's a country musician worried about his country and reels a litany of problems starting with "a land of the lost, locked up and poor", and carrying on from there

Cory Legendre is all bitterness in You Get What You Voted For - off his album, We Tried To Tell You (cover with Putin and Musk and a sitting Trump). Albeit looking at vote counts in the recent election, I'd hope the b-side would address those who didn't vote.

Lopkerjo has fully signed up with the resistance and has Nobody Voted For This, the titular track of his furious album... Still, methinks that Liz Cheney Hero of Integrity is where I step off (I would have added a question mark to that song title at the very least, but your mileage may vary).

Late in 2024, Me & Melancholy wounded by Trump's victory released We Never Voted For This. Working fast but protesting too much, I think. Who is the We he is talking about? I would rather point him in the direction of Antibalas's 2010 album, Who is this America Dem Speak of Today?

YaBoi Dirty is more philosophical with Who You Voted For. His is more a plague o' both your houses missive. The kind of demoralized outlook that would lower voter turnout - and perhaps that is the point of his intervention. Politicians are crooks, spokesmen for the rich etc...

Stepping back to 2022, we have part of Ben Frank's standup comedy routine which is riffing on political hypocrisy with This Is What You Voted For. The private sexual mores versus the public severe prudity. Cynicism about the bonafides of leaders.

Turn to hip-hop also in 2022, Mr Trumptastic released You Voted For Jb You Must Be Smoking Dope. He'd had enough of a whole year of Joe Biden's presidency and was looking forward to Trump's rightful return. One wonders if he'll have more to say for the current moment.

in 2021, Art Neuro, more punk than rock, chimed in with This Is The Stuff You Voted For taken from his Sadistic Ineptitude album. Not quite mellifluous, his is a rather acidic take.

Preaching reconciliation in 2021, JCAR93 weighs in with Come Together (Even If You Voted For Trump), trap rap noodling. I suspect The Beatles were more artistically successful being all sugary and omitting the snark.

In 2020 from England, we have If You Voted For This Then You Are Part Of The Problem by Dannydangerously, his grime flow is less outraged at Boris Johnson's shenanigans than of his countrymen's continued voting for the Tories. England was then the new epicenter of the covid pandemic.

In 2015, Me Time released You Voted For This. Again punk-inflected, and furious about the GOP's assault (presumably under Bush) on gun control, the EPA, bloody wars, corporate cronyism.

"Thank God we chose to back the GOP / The world is a wasteland / It's piles of grass, ash and sand"

Also in 2015, The Walking Toxins chime in with You Voted For Them. Angry at a fascist state that dropped the bomb (unclear whether it was Obama drones or Bush shock and awe that drew their ire). Like the music they produce here, they are not happy campers.

In 2012, Zygsville sound bewildered in Who Voted for This, a nice uptempo joint that one can do a line dance to. More musically interesting with some nice guitar licks. Giving the date of the release, I suspect Barack Obama wasn't his favorite but the lyrics are rather ambiguous consequently the song has legs.

In 2008, Beatnik Turtle whistles his acute observations on buyer's remorse, describing how the new guy becomes "the incumbent, he's got the peoples mandate, but he's passing wacky laws now, showing all his flaws and he's the guy that everyone hates. And all of a sudden nobody voted for this guy"

The humourous point is well taken about how partisans turn quiet when those they put in power screw the pooch. And, quite likely, this year we'll be repeating the observers are worried mantra.

Stylistically, then, the songs are mostly country, rock and punk, perhaps because I stuck to the Anglosphere. It's not easy listening as the singers are trying to provoke a reaction. Where we have hip-hop, the political commentary is a sideshow, braggadocio is a necessity in that form.

I do think that the songs with songs that broaden the perspective will likely endure but I appreciate the lesser works as fodder for the time capsule, cultural artifacts for later historians mining the zeitgeist of these trying times. I hope we make it to the other side.


Bonus beats: Your Mess by Omar, timeless soul, and an extract from Black Wax the film that featured a live performance by Gil Scott Heron of B-movie

• You Voted For This, a playlist (Youtube, Spotify)

File under: USA, England, election, humour, satire, music, review, culture, observation, perception, Creative Process, hatchet job, Buyer's Remorse, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log: May 4, 2025