The Mouth Of Babes.... Poem by Tony Jolley

'I Will Survive…'
She sang,
With all the garnered gravitas
Of the fifteen carefree years behind her,
Emerging from the bathroom
Robed and wrapped in chenille
Topped off by a nonchalant towel-turban
Of the type every lass can throw on in a trice
And lads would have to plan and plot for ages
With set-square, protractor and calculator
Before even daring to drape.

'I Will Survive…'

'Survive what? ', I thought,
Laughing inwardly at an innocence and insouciance
That can sing words with audacity and sincerity
Devoid of the vaguest idea of their veracity.
Putting my pyjama seat to the freshly-laundered bed sheet,
It occurred to me,
Not for the first time,
That she might have been right…

Unemployment up 11% just in the slide into recession –
And god-knows what that'll turn into
If it becomes a full-blown depression.
How can we expect her to get interested in employment choice
When some careers may not even be here
By the time she arrives
At the end of the educational production line?
Production lines? -
They're already on half-time
At Peugeot and Renault,
And to save their automotive bacon
Amidst the current crisis
And its dramatically falling prices
Citroen announces a new luxury model:
Exactly what planet are they on?

Forgetting the Economy
For a moment,
[… If only …],
There's the Environment:
Mother Nature;
Well, what's left of her
After we've plundered and squandered
So much of her riches.
Now she seems to be settling in
For a long siege around our beleaguered cities:
A siege she must win.
She has to protect herself
To protect us from ourselves
Or we will be the ultimate losers.
No snowcaps for Kilamanjaro or FujiYama.
Basic crops set to yield less
In the prairies of the Steppes and the US Midwest,
Prices soaring and a real breadline appearing
On tomorrow's downtown horizon
For those formerly economically well above it.
Water down the Yangtze and Hwang Ho
Reduced to a trickle, no longer a flow,
Whilst the Chinese millions continue to grow.
The same scenario being played out
From Pole to blue-water Pole.

'I will survive…'

She's got more than a point
Whether she yet knows or no.