For A Fairer Future Poem by C Richard Miles

And when you say that life's not fair,
The answer comes: Why should I care?

Why should I care if others suffer?
I'm alright, Jack; go bother others

This amount of apathy is quite endemic,
Though this is not a totemic polemic,

I'm simply stating the clear-cut case
That there's inequality we've got to face.

For far too few are prepared to fight
For this crucial cause; As long as they're all right,

They can't be fussed; they can't be bothered:
Unless they've got their bases covered

For their own interests, they won't risk it
In adopting attitudes more altruistic.

That's how it is in this benighted nation
That's right on the road to the fires of damnation:

It's ignore the poor, aspire for riches,
So, unless this problematic position switches

How much more potential will we waste
In our inner-city sink estates?

And even those who fight for fairness:
Are they, deep down, really right and earnest?

For I still detect some sneaking suspicions
That even those rarities: principled politicians


Don't give a fig for the downcast and dejected
As soon as the electors have got them elected.

And what of them - those city slickers
That jeer at the jobless? They're just thoughtless thickos.

Don't let them think they're immured in immunity
Inside their gated, closed community.

Where would they be, these witless wasters,
The brainless bankers, the tightwad traders?

Where would they be without "our" money?
They'd feel proper pain; it wouldn't be funny

If they were dealt some sudden shocks
And end on the Embankment in a cardboard box.

When hardship hits the moneyed faction
Perhaps that'll startle them into action

To fight for fairness, for which we ask.
We're tired of taking them to task.

When will these wasters realise
The answer's there, right before their eyes?

For what we need is some redistribution
Of their ill-gained wealth: a sound solution.

So each can live without having to worry
Where the cash is coming from? I'm trying to bury

The idea that each man must look after himself
And it's his own problem if he's left on the shelf


While the ones that are lucky will forge ahead
As he scrapes for a pittance till he drops down dead.

Is is right that the few should have most of the moolah
While the millions, the masses find that life's much crueller?

And have to struggle to settle their bills
A shake-up and and a share-out might solve some of these ills.

Perhaps there's an amount on which we all agree
That all should be given to end all poverty.

But I'm not saying we all should follow
The precise same path; that's too sour to swallow

For those who won't or can't conform.
I'm not asking even for an acceptable norm:

As long as diversity is tolerated
And difference recognised and certainly not hated.

That works both ways; we don't need pious preachers
Insisting that the only way to live is what they teach us.

But we shouldn't make mock; we should try to forgive
If they follow their convictions; as long as they let live.

And don't ostracise outsiders and don't interfere
With other people's liberty. Have I made it clear?

I know I'm banging on about the same theme
Time and time again but I just want to scream

When I hear those not badly off loudly declare
That it just isn't just; it just isn't fair.

Since we're all in it together in this birth-to-death dance,
A struggle for survival; Let's give it a chance.

Let's not think just about ourselves but of others instead
And perhaps, just perhaps, we can sleep sound in our beds

Content in the knowledge that though for some life's still tough
That we have tried our best; that we have done our stuff.

Since we've proved to the world our compassion and care
As we've firmly fought the fight to make life more fair.