“Preparing us to death”
When we were kids
at school, for fun
they taught us to walk
never to run
To the grass and tarmac
where we played
were suddenly our classroom
set ablaze.
Some days we sat
against cellar walls
waiting for A-bombs to fall. ((Air raid drills were routine in US schools from the time the Soviet Union detonated its first atomic bomb until the early 70s. Schools were designated as fallout shelters.))
As we grew older
were we scared
went camping as scouts
to be prepared.
Later even
some were watchful
bore swords and rifles
always faithful. ((The motto of the US Empire’s shock troops, the Marine Corps, is semper fidelis.))
Growing older
still were scared
to kill more gooks
were well prepared.
Now we have kids
with no school or fun
Now taught their faces not to show
Less than six paces not to go,
To take their shots in ass or arm
To trust that murderers mean no harm
Who gave us fire
Who gave us bombs
Who children ripped from mother’s wombs
That live they may at our expense
Disease and poison cloaked in nonsense
For the world they risks prepared
Every day to keep us scared,
Against cellar walls we will tire
Waiting to fill each other’s tombs.
• “The Global Preparedness Monitoring Board (GPMB) is an unaccountable lobby constituted to promote the concept of ‘global health emergencies’ as a strategy for imposing corporate and Anglo-American imperial objectives under the colour of healthcare. It derives its principal support from The World Bank Group and WHO but is kept at arm’s length so that its activities on behalf of those bodies and their owners remain deniable. The 15-member board includes the staple figureheads and persons whose actual allegiances may only be guessed. The GPMB fronts for those who are the beneficiaries of wartime conditions for power and profit.”