Poverty By Rote Poem by Mark Heathcote

Where's the dialogue between the rich and the poor
Those who have and stand tall—those left behind to crawl.
What we require is a poet in residence
Like the one at Fremont Bridge with two testicles;
The one that crosses Lake Washington Ship Canal
In part might keep both sides happy - rational.
In France, the yellow vests movement are making protests
In Hong Kong, there are anti-extradition protests
Governments the world over are short on hearing.
Their benevolence always to be endearing
To the bankers and their corrupt party sponsors
And in England-always in the New-year honour's
Where's the dialogue, where's the bridge and where's the voice
Of reason and justice, who listens to our noise?
Our castrated expressions are strangled at birth,
But it is we cast out like-so-much afterbirth
With a birth certificate, ownership papers
A number, raise up glass-ceilinged ladders
But the future is shaped by each generation
That holds a ballot box vote affiliation
Wavers to decide between the choices of two?
Nothing changes no one is ever overthrew
Only the hoodwinked, gullible allowed a vote
The child brought-up-in constant poverty by rote.