
PEACE IS NOT JUST THE ABSENCE OF WAR (selected poems volume 2) by Mark Beechill

PAPERWORK
A CONSPIRACY OF TWATS
If this goes on for much longer
I’ll be
Torn
Scorned
Burned up
Churned out
Forgotten
Left for dead
Face down
In a pile
Of unfinished paperwork
EIGHT KINDS OF SCONE
Today I learnt
That the pinnacle of human achievement
Is a garden centre
That has eight kinds
Of scone.
And if this customer
Doesn’t get their scone mix on time
Then
It’s the end of the world
GAME OVER.
And we all have to run around
Like headless chickens
For the simple reason that
WE CANNOT RUN OUT OF SCONES
I have to wonder
At what point
The human race
Went wrong.
A conspiracy of twats
Connived to make John’s day
A bag of shit
One of them
Had been conspiring for so long
That he knew nothing else
Even how to be a human being
This, for him
Was the way forward
Elsewhere, from across the office,
Another one spoke
With a mouth full of food:
“I still get up every morning,
And I can’t wait to come in here
And see these people,”
She meant it, too
Even though
It was her last day
John sat at his desk,
Failing.
SORRY
They were angry
So angry
That they wanted to put a brick through the window
So that someone would listen
So that someone would know
But they felt guilt
And would tie a note to the brick
That said ‘sorry’
With a cheque attached
For the damages