Looking At Us (Hope It All Goes Away)

What has happened to us?

Have we become someone new, more frightened, more extreme, more judgemental of our neighbours?

Are we critical of the man down the street who goes out more than once a day just for pleasure?

He’s not shopping, he’s training in the park, along with a hundred other people.

Is it necessary? No it can’t be!

He should sit at home with the rest of us, watching TV to keep our mind off this awful news.

Immerse yourself in comedy and satire, mindless romance, endless escapism,

anything that’s not real,

to keep our minds off this awful tragedy which envelopes our nation and every nation in turn.

 

Let us hope they put a stop to it.

Let us hope the health services all keep up,

that governments and hospitals can all keep going and organize sufficiently to keep us safe,

and protect us from the grim reaper of the virus.

Shut the world out and hope it all goes away.

 

We don’t have to do anything.

Just stay at home, as instructed and hope it all goes away.

At least we don’t have to fight in a war, or work hard,

unless we are a medical worker in the emergency coronavirus wards.

When the lockdown ends we will all be able to sigh with relief,

come out onto the streets and shake hands again.

But do we want to return to where we were?

Were we satisfied with pen pushing all day,

meeting targets and travelling everywhere at breakneck speed?

 

We’re giving mother earth a rest.

No longer do the aeroplanes spill poison into the atmosphere at an alarming rate,

and warm the planet beyond safe limits.

They’re all grounded.

Now we can travel inside our homes.

I’ve got travel programmes recorded in abundance.

Explore the sunny Greek Isles in the safety of your front room,

or the bumpy streets of Lisbon with its rich history.

 

The streets of Rome are empty.

The tourists have all gone away.

I wonder where all the handbag snatchers have gone?

Even the locals are home, hoping they ain’t got the disease.

 

Even the Streets of Bergama can be visited nowadays,

from the insides of our own homes.

It wasn’t so famous before,

but now millions in Britain, and even America, probably know its name,

and how beautiful and sad its streets are.

We even know the inside of their hospitals,

and how the medical heroes and heroines have been battling with the virus,

and exhaustion and despair,

like the visitation of some 14^th or 15^th century plague.

Without sufficient equipment, catching the dreaded virus themselves,

many of them, like the front line in some war from previous centuries,

never thought to land again in modern day progressive Italy.

The old folk thought they were safe in this land of birth control, culture tourism, and plenty,

protected from financial and medical worries.

It was a place where they could grow old with dignity and respect.