Our voices are simply the shadows
Cast by our dreams and our thought
If the shadows become ineffectual
Then our voices will end up as naught
Yet shadows can give us the outline
Of what is looming above
If we take note of the darkness
We can give those dreams a shove
One thing we must yet remember
To give those shadows a shape
Sunlight is needed behind it
From brightness, the dreams will escape
Sir Richard Francis Burton
For who life was so certain
He was a master of disguise
Caught Mecca by surprise
Turn upon turn upon turn upon turn
Green upon green upon green upon green
Tracks and tracks and shining silver
Decision-making machine
Can it take the pressures
Of expectations on board
Will I
I make cars
I always have
As did my father.
Prestige cars.
The most famous in the world
Made with pride.
Made with precision.
Made to last.
To shine and glide!
Every working day.
All the working hours.
My trusty hands create.
I may be steeped in habit
Tradition and old ways
But I trust in my own fate.
I support my family.
I support the plant.
And I support the land.
I pay my way my dues
while on my shoulders weighs
the burden that I support.
After all these years of toil
All my many dues.
Imagine my surprise, my boss.
I have given more than you!
In response to the daily prompt Famous
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Astonished
By the lacking
The stupidity
The greed
More astonishing still
Are we
And our
Compliance
Shall we march?
Shall we shout?
Or kneel
And take it
As always
A turn our eyes away
To bright distractions
In response to my daily prompt March
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In this mess
It must cross our minds
When Parliament fails us
There is a
Precedent
To remove them
In response to my daily prompt Precedent
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The redistribution of wealth from the masses to the very rich minority continues apace. The groundwork has been laid.
First, we were seduced with the idea of quick riches – that we could join that elite. Invest in stock and shares – and be a part of our club they said – while they sold off our services.
Be free of your landlord – they said – own your own home – they say – while they sold off social housing.
Invest in your future – save for a rainy day – build your pension pot they said – while they took that money for their own ends.
With the rise of the subscription services model – we no longer own anything. Gone are record collections and family libraries – to be replaced with an intangible library
And now – the pressures start. Our kids start their adult lives saddled with debt from just educating themselves. We, their parents are so under pressure from austerity that we cannot support them. Remortgage after remortgage – after all nothing is as safe as houses.
But when the time comes and we look for our pensions – they are not there! They have underperformed or have just been stolen – gone into the black hole of bankrupt companies.
And then – surprise, surprise – there are suddenly all these companies that can help – with equity release or webuyanyhouse.com quick sale promises. All that property – that once belonged to us all – that we dreamed of passing down to our children is being hoovered up. They will end up in the hands of a very few large property magnates.
And we will be back in a feudal society once more. When everything is owned by a few – power will be theirs.
In response to my daily prompt Estate
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For the sake of one
Stray meteor dinosaurs
Might exist today
In response to RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #230 Exist&Today
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Respect is
Expected
Everywhere you go
Respect my rights
My views
My thoughts
We have forgotten
Respect
Should be earned
Not expected
Mutual
And reciprocated
In response to my daily prompt Respect
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Same, same, same
Same job
Same problems
Same pressure
I am wood
Not stone
In response to my daily prompt Pressure
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Insurance
Remember
we have none
On the earth
In response to my daily prompt Insurance
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From the symbol of peace
Comes a stealthy killer
Seductive and insidious
Giving all
It appears
But taking all
Even tears
In response to my daily prompt Heroin
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Leading with honour
Bonding with friendship, not fear
True path to glory
In response to RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #227 Truth&Honor but also inspired by David Attenborough’s latest masterpiece Dynasties
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Little pieces
Torn from our hearts
Rearranged memories
Making pictures
To last through time
Until the days
When they are no longer
Remembered
Just seen
As a mystery
From the past
In response to my daily prompt Mosaic
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An ice warning sign
A dark winding country road
Still, they whizz on by
In response to my daily prompt Warning
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There is a puzzle
Seen from way up on high, that
Only birds can solve
In response to RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #226 Question&Resolve
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Global warming
You might think
It will bring us tropical summers
It won’t
It will freeze us
Before it burns us
In response to my daily prompt Tropical
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Is it coincidence
That those that urged us to leave
Have left
In response to my daily prompt Coincidence
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The carrot
Is getting bigger
Nearer
More tantalising
Imagine the stick to follow
In response to my daily prompt Carrot
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Eleven fifty
Nine and almost out of time
Yet still ploughing on
In response to my daily prompt Late
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Who’s in partnership with who?
Are those that fight really enemies?
Is it all a show?
Distracting us from the truth
While they steal from us
Freedom, wealth and everything
In response to my daily prompt Partnership
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Flying is an art
The pigeon needs no compass
To find its way home
In response to RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #224 Art&Compass
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Ruthlessness
Meanness
These are the traits
The media feeds us
Tells us we need
To succeed
Thus preparing us
For exploitation
In response to my daily prompt Trait
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Small
But in control
Determined
Light touch
On throbbing power
Riders
In response to my daily prompt Trainer
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Running
So fast we run
Stay ahead of the game
This is the story we are sold
Suckers
In response to my daily prompt Resolution
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Featured snippets
Knowledge panes
Keyword magic
Am I insane?
Chasing figures
Spun in the air
Where do I begin?
Where do I begin?
In response to my daily prompt Feature
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This mini-series of poems were written as part of a year-long daily poem challenge and published in my collection A Spring of Dreams. They are in a form called Pleiades (read about it here).
I chose to write seven of them one for each of the original Pleiades – the stars once called the seven sisters, and base the poems around the mythological characters.
Another spirit lost
Awash in the swell and foam
Anguished over lost love
Anger dealt him the blow
Arising from the sea
Alighting on the air
A bright bird arises
A nymph darts between trees
Afraid of the hunter
Always close behind her
Away she flees in haste
Another danger lurks
At her feet as she runs
A butterfly is born
Caressed by the wide sea
Corals catch the new child
Carry her to the shore
Colliding with bright fate
Climbing into the sky
Coronal light shines out
Cascading to the sea
Ever shining bright spark
Equalizing her rage
Encompassing justice
Ever seeking revenge
Endless pain unanswered
Echoing from murder
Electra takes her aim
Mother of he who brought
Music up to the Gods
Malice turned to justice
Magic cascading from
Mother of the world storm
Mighty God of the earth
Must meet a mortal end.
Marriage was forbidden
Mortal husband taken
Masked in a veil of shame
Must watch her husband’s pain
Most faint in the heavens
Marred by following love
Misty those lives above
The hunter is hunted
Twisting between the trees
Turned into doe from nymph
Trailed by her lover’s bow
Tumbling through the forest
Two golden horns that shine
To rise into the skies
In response to my daily prompt Cluster
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Ban
The things
We don’t like
Or understand
Don’t agree?
Are you sure?
I mean look at it.
Intimidating
Scary
Dangerous
Just take a look
At what’s happening
The rapes, the murders
Think of the children
That’s it!
You know it makes sense
Join with us
Ratify it!
Stamp it!
Make it official
Make it law!
Good!
What’s next?
Blue eye!
I hate them.
Let’s kill all the blue-eyed
Bastards
In response to my daily prompt Ban
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The arrogant moon
Believed he outshone the sun
But she disagreed
In response to RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #220 He&She
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In neutral gear
Idling
Sitting on the fence
Not taking sides
Until pushed
Off
In response to my daily prompt Neutral
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Berry
Suet
Logs
Have become
Something
To get
Excited about
In my life
How did that happen
In response to my daily prompt Berry
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Good
Good enough
Goodnight
In response to my daily prompt Good
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Grimace
And bear it
It’s got to be
More honest
Than an empty
Grin
In response to my daily prompt Grimace
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Just too tired today so cheating – finding old posts that happen to have the word activity in them
When present is past
All the poison will still seep
Deadly legacy
In response to RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #217 Poison&Past
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So the soldier walks alone
The origin
Of the species
Is
Competition
Survival of the fittest
The strongest
The smartest
The origin
Of our success
Is cooperation
Working together
Against a goal
If
For a few measly coins
We forget the latter
And embrace the former
The species
Will find
Its end
In response to my daily prompt Origin
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Heroes are silent
Cowards protest loud and fierce
We are in between
In response to RonovanWrites RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #216 Hero&Coward
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Declaration
Protestation
Exclamation
Consternation
No explanation
No realisation
Just expectation
This small nation
Done
In response to my daily prompt Declaration
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Lace
Disparate resonances
Delicate dowagers, making doilies
And fine trim for prim and proper ladies
And
Lacy underwear
Designed to be divested
In fast passion
And
Purity
White and bright
Smiling bride
Lead to the groom
Leading to the room
And back to the
Lacy underwear
In response to my daily prompt Lace
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So I was daydreaming in the bath – thinking about a book I read long ago – a biography of a famous 19th-century explorer and how he could be seen as representing men as a whole – but that’s a whole other post that will be coming soon.
Anyway – in the wandering way of my mind this lead me to thinking about how men have become demonised in the media generally. We are seen as stupid or beasts or slovenly – I could go on. But then, I thought women get it just as bad and then there’s ethnic minorities, the poor, immigrants – the list goes on. And on.
Maybe it’s just rich white people who get off lightly – but even as you read this what are you thinking? Of those Etonian brothers who keep their friend rich via nepotism and corruption while sneering at the poor? The rich wives from Chelsea with their lap dogs and expensive handbags and no clue about the real world?
See even they are demonised.
Why?
Who by – that’s an easier question. The media. And we all know that the media is run by those in power. I am no conspiracy theory nut – I don’t believe that there’s a tightly organised elite pulling the strings. Rather I think it’s like a self-sustaining system which lifts the people it needs to maintain its stability into positions of power. But whatever the reason – the media is the tool of that system.
So again why? Why demonise every single sector of society?
Control. If you cannot be proud of where you came from how can you rise to greatness? Great people can threaten the order of things, they can lead people out of their everyday drudgery and tedium. Out of wage slavery and obedience.
So greatness is stifled. In the modern garden of the world, the land is left to weeds and overgrowth. Anything that rises above the weed line is quickly cut down or sprayed with toxins until it wilts.
In such a barren and ill-tended garden, how can we expect flowers? How can we have anything more than poor harvests?
We should tend our garden better.
In response to my daily prompt Conspiracy
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“That’s proper lush, that is”
And you are in a time and place
While the grammar nazis squirm
Layer upon layer of meaning is conveyed
Language
Being used
For its intended purpose
In response to my daily prompt Language
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Some of us are tourists
Some of us are peddlers
Some just love the night
Some just have the feeling
That all of this is just inside our head
How can we control it?
How do we define it?
Is it in our head?
What if we just follow where we’re led?
On the tourist trail
In response to my daily prompt Tourist
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Time to take
The initiative
Maybe
Or perhaps
Tomorrow
Already too late
It’s gone
When I wasn’t looking
While I thought
And fought
With doubts and fears
Follow on
Follow on
In response to my daily prompt Initiative
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The rumbling of the belly
Is the trap
The bait
Led us down a one-way path
No turning back
And keeps us here
In response to my daily prompt Belly
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Winter brooks no fool
Or those lacking hunters fire
The cold teeth are sharp
In response to RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #214 Lack&Fool
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Always open, ever weeping
The wound of inequality
But still they slash, cut down their crop
And with contempt they fill their boots
Screaming sights and flashing sounds
Headlines tinged with hate
Keep us poor and keep us scared
Or else eliminate
In response to my daily prompt Boot
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Child lacking safety
Will grow to fear the wide world
And narrow their mind
In response to my daily prompt Narrow
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This is my platform
And the train is leaving
Without me
Never got to say
What I had to say
Ticket in hand
In response to my daily prompt Platform
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My life is thin
Shallow
Two dimensional
No point
No end
Twisted
Mobius
In response to my daily prompt Thin
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Scott Andrew Bailey - Author 
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