Indifference and Lily: Two Poems of Social Commentary

Lily in the Style of John William Waterhouse: Created by Copilot 365. Prompt by Michael B. Thomas

Well, well, well. I trust that you are probably sick of hearing it because you don't feel the weight of it, but the revisions of Atheists and Empty Spaces are coming to an end for this round pretty quickly.--You know, I have continuously that poems are never finished, so I will revise these same poems again. Of that, I am sure.--I counted and I have nine poems left. Two of those are really long poems, but I am almost ready to publish. I hope that I can get my friend Patrick Gillespie to write a foreword for me. He may not want to do it. Who knows?

Anyway, neither of these poems needs an introduction or explanation except to say that the first is inspired by a poem by Matthew Arnold called The Buried Life and the second was inspired by a news article that I read some 10-15 years ago. It seems very prophetic of me looking back at the original. That's all I've got to say. As always, ENJOY!

Indifference

(With deference to Matthew Arnold)

We grow more cozy year by year

In the comforts of modern life.

Deep passion is a thing we fear,

The zealous root of all our strife.

We make our peace with tepid love,

For we have nothing left to prove.

We eat our mush that has no taste,

Relieved that it’s not spiced.

A novel bite is such a waste

When we prefer our white bread sliced.

White bread, white mush, and table salt,

These things we love! It’s not our fault!

We’re trained to think outside a box,

To wrap our minds around a square.

What use is truth or paradox

When even faith is empty air?

And we can quickly heat shit up

As fast as we can eat it up?

Alas, a cynical soul of wit,

A greater sense of irony,

Is valued near the same as spit

But slightly more than poetry.

For us, it’s displayed on TV

And slyly masked as comedy.

True to its form, no subject bores

Or holds our interest for less time

Than all of our incessant wars

And the political sublime.

By “sublime,” I mean “religion,”

A matter far too dull to mention.

Duller still are our feeble laws

And dimmer still the enforcers,

For what was once probable cause

Is now inducement for lawyers

Who become judges of our peers

And stick blind justice in arrears.

But you and I, are we content

To let the people live like fools?

Is this the style in which we meant

To squander our cerebral tools?

And could we set the world aright?

Well…most likely not--but we might.

Lily

Lily loves a painted garden,

No pollen for her nose.

She knows an image, like a name,

Can smell of any rose.

Lily wants a world of love,

But none that she can feel

And lovers who fill all her needs

With nothing that is real.

Lily lives a comfy life

Ensconced upon a wall,

Embowered in both joy and peace

With no pain near at all.

But Lily is a bully

 Of people she’s never seen

Because she is a mindless girl

Behind a lifeless screen.