Two days ago I had joined the Unemployment Queue. I had been putting it off trying to navigate the quagmire online with no success.
After a long wait, people begin to talk to one another. I had a nice chat with a woman behind me and occasionally the line would cheer when one person would get to go in the office. It was a long wait but ended up not as long as we all thought when the queue didn't move for half an hour (75 mins in the end).
Of course, there was the inevitable queue jumper. This woman tried it on and couldn't believe that I would not let her in. She was entitled and selfish. Unbelievable.
That night I wrote the poem below.
or
Alone in the queue
There’s them
And then there’s you
Everyone is a potential enemy
Easily disarmed
By an amusing sentence
And speared through
By a kind word.
How swiftly
They can belong to you
And you to them
With an eye to
Recruitment.
Misery may love company
But sure as hell can’t keep it
Nothing feeds the fire
More than the warmth
Of freshly made
Solidarity.
Anthony J. Langford 15.4.20
....
(below is the post I planned for this week before my experience above, written in 2018)
Snared Status
A singular viewpoint
Will see me unstuck
Judged, condemned n' quartered.
As it would anyone
Outside the current (2018) vocal
Anti-white straight male brigade.
How narrow their focus
How overblown their protests.
It’s not new
And long been amusing to me
Except meeting very
Young People
Who have swallowed the hook with the best
Oblivious to the pain
And status of the snared.
I would have been a potential stat too
Had I been of a certain age
Discerning
Is for the experienced
And Rebellion is for Youth.
Sell an idea as an injustice
And you create revolution
How easy to manipulate.
I should have done it years ago.
This poem is included in my new collection of poems on Social Media, Commentators only $5.