Tag: Poetry

Hi My names Martin Anton Smith, a creative showcasing his wares and ideas…thank you for listening to my podcast “The Baby wants his bottle inc.”

Part 1 : Note from 2021: this blog post and poem was written in late 2019, a little before the Covid crisis, – and alas we are well into this new crisis as I speak here now, on 5 March 2021. When I wrote this original piece 18 months ago, the world was well into troubling financial and difficult social times – I have argued often that since 1980 western society has thrown out many “healthy babies” (such as full employment) along with the old bathwater (such as narrowmindedness) of the past. Thatcher and Reagan (And those kiwi followers Lange, Douglas then Bolger and Richard son in New Zealand ) pushed the ideology of “Market forces” and “individualism”  and “efficiency” these catch phrases put in action, were supposed to make everyone wealthier and healthier. Jobs were shipped, Structural unemployment became a thing, and speculators and big corporations were given a structural competitive advantage, you might say. The big boys never had so much power and influence in profit and the halls of power – bought politicians became legal from this era onwards . 41 years on from that doctrine we have seen huge declines in wealth and health to the great majority of middle and working classes, while the very few have had income explosions. We’ve seen corporations wantonly create massive pollution harming the ecology, and at the least moderately affecting global weather patterns. This is not conjecture but is economic and historical fact, the data is very strong especially on the economics.  The next part of this podcast/blog , part 2, is a report of the poem reading I did in 2019 in Dunedin, and the last part – Part 3 Is called – “The Mindcrime war of 1”  it’s about the psychological warfare that is on show, unbeknown to so many, and that has pervaded the west in particular since the world war 1 era to present. It’s a commentary on how life in our times are merely the flowers that were once roots, that were once seeds and seedlings – history is a river and everything is some kind of outgrowth, or less commonly death and regeneration. In part 4 I will talk again from 5 March 2021 and talk wether my thoughts have changed or reversed since writing the poem.

End of part 1. 

Part 2 Begins (note : This the original Post from 2019.). Yesterday I went to the ‘Dog with Two tails’ cafe in Dunedin NZ, for its weekly ‘open mic’ poetry night. I read one poem called “the mindwar of 1”, this was a shortened version from the original , – which was overly long I guess (which I will re write the read aloud version here soon). But First a little report about the night. This was the second time I had read a poem at this venue, and the first since 2 years ago in 2017 – where I read a ‘quasi poem’ of whimsy which basically outlined my nerd like Poem called “The two Leonards” – This was a quandary in the style of wondering aloud/stream of consciousness, about who was cooler – was it a) Stanford Universities famed Physicist Leonard Susskind (dubbed ‘the bad boy of Physics for his Alpha Male persona) or was it B), Leonard Nimoy the late actor who played the logical to a fault, half man half Vulcan Alien character known as “Spock” in the original sci-fi series “Star Trek”. Anyway this time I got serious and presented a poem that talked of an important issue – the fact that we are continual objects of propaganda by the state and their ever present bosses the entrenched powerful uber elites, who are the real puppet masters of our so called “democracy” and “Modern Capitalism” – The main thrust of the poem is that we have been blinded by the slow moving nature of society, its slow moving power structures, and the system of subterfuge that has been made such an ever pervading and perfected “quasi dictatorship” since 1919 in particular – the years of Bretton Woods/ Money Printing /diluting and leaving the Gold standard /Deficits to fund wars/the falsity of general Elections always being two horse races that are really “one horse races”. I float the thesis that ww1 ww2 and ww3 (which is a continuing undeclared war for your mind, based on the production of fear, so you will always be grateful for the “crumbs that fall off the table” of those that really matter (the elites that have a very stable existence based on this highly perfected system since 1919). As i have said in my draft unfinished essays – the expert methods of the 1920s-50s Dictators used, have simply been expanded and perfected – much like that of the history of technology. The effect is that we have largely (apart from a few pockets of illumination) become the Frog on the skillet, that fails to jump out because it fails to register a change of temperature owing to such a piecemeal and incremental increasing of the gas temperature . And so we the Frog burns alive and fails to save its life, it has become tricked into being helpless – like we are in 2019, we still believe in the system of madness that subjugates at least 50% of us (the World economic forum released a graph a few weeks ago tracking an ever increasing inequality of wealth transfering from the bottom upwards – so much so that 99.3% of the words wealth is in the hands of the top 50% and the top 1% owns 48% – this is essentially a Ponzi Scheme system – those on the bottom are forever raided by those ever towards the top, and you must always add another layer of those on the bottom to keep the whole charade continuing – this is why central banks must always continue to print fiat (fake) money. Edit from twenty twenty one:  I must of course say that it is not all doom , we have many chances to right wrongs and we can become wiser and more community minded without giving up on capitalism and hard work, this in a nutshell is the answer to our modern western woes. end edit.  

Anyway the Poetry night in Moray Place Dunedin NZ that night was a very busy one, the cafe (the Dog with two tails) had opened up a second room, which was great to see, a testament to the great arts scene in Dunedin. There was a good mix of young and older poets, some seasoned and others (like me) relatively new to the scene of reading and writing poetry. Interesting the first fellow up to read did some standup comedy instead, and in John Lennon circa 1966 fashion compared himself to Jesus – which took the rather stressed middle aged MC by surprise – it did raise some chortles though, including myself. I had along with a new friend who is a philosopher and poetry writer as well – although they did not read on this occasion – but have before I am told. (Edit from 2021-th faded away after meeting a new girlfriend in Christchurch, end edit). Anyway I was a little understandably nervous, but not so much and my delivery was quite good – a strong steady cambre, which suited the poem well. I got a reasonable clap at the end and a couple of interested -or maybe befuddled -‘hmms’. All in all it was fun and part of the journey of being better at talking in front of crowds and sharing my ideas – which I so used to avoid due to shyness. Afterwards my friend and I went to the Octagon pub and talked philosophical matters and enjoyed a post mortem of the events from the night. Anyway coming up in part 3 is the poem I read at the “Dog With Two tails” in Moray place Dunedin on Aug 21. (P.s. incidentally, I believe its international Poetry day Tmw the 23rd Aug? I hope to go to some events – I will report back if I do, and if I read anything). End of part 2 

Part 3 begins – this is The Poem I read in august 21 called “the Mindcrime War of 1” (writers note: thats a bad title which I should rename now to something clever like “The 100 Year Old Boiled Frog Chronicles” , no without further delay let me begin the poem – “The Mindcrime war of 1”)

1984
Was Not The Year It Started
But The Year Of The Decisive Battle
Won By The Enemy
When Globalisation was Sold
As the Answer
To Further Your Fears
To Make you Weak
The Year It Began Was 1919
The Seed Was Sown
Of Our Peoples Decline
The Absurd idea Now
Is Demanded Tomorrow
You just Need The Seed
To Sow The Seed In Time
In The People’s Minds
Engage The Fear
Reward The Hate
Divide And Conquer
Slip Through The Door
While The People Fight
A Stitch In Time
Seeded The Decline
The Continuous War
For Your Energy
Against Your Mind
Is Fought In The Mind
Thoughts Are Weapons
You’re Not Like Them
You’re Not Allowed In

But They Want Your Energy
They Want Your Body
They Want Your Mind
By A Leash Chains
Fear Is The Answer
Fear Is The Tool
You Are Told You Can’t Do
You Are Told You Are Useless
To Make You Grateful
For The Crumbs
that Fall From the Table
Fight Back
Write and Speak
Of These Truths
There’s A War For your Mind
Its Been Going Since 1919
The Ashes Of World War One
Seeded World War Two
Created Expert Propaganda
To Control The Mind
Controls The Crowd
Controls The Country
Controls The World
Controls The Past
Controls The Present
Controls the Future
WW1 WW2 WW3
They Are All One War
But Phase Changes
WW3 The Undeclared War
The War For Your Mind
The War No One Realised
They Were Living In
The Woke Few Saw This
They Were Maligned
As Conspiracy Theorists
And Declared Crackpots, (this is the end of Poem)

Part 3 end, part 4 begins

My thoughts about that ww3 is upon us have not changed, the war we are in is like my poem says, a mind war. The proof is that in a war there is always a point where the loser is seen to emerge. In 1943 it was Germany and Now it is the general population of the earth. In 2019 I was more of the thought that the neoliberal political elite and the billionaires were the victors, but in 2021 I think their victory has begun to be vanquished by Mother Nature itself. Covid 19 is simply a sign that the most destructive and intelligent force we know is fighting back – the Earth itself. I think of course the misfiring system of neoliberalism will continue its mindwars , just know that indeed ww4 has also begun. Ww4 is the true alien invasion, it is the cosmic intelligence raring it’s physical manifestation to squash a particularly annoying bug – greedy humans. Of course the neoliberal puppet masters know this and the propaganda will flow to ensure the public don’t awake from their slumber. There job will be to muster all that has been learnt in persuasion tactics since 1919 – and then some. They have had it good in the smoke and mirror game of disempowerment of 99% of earth’s inhabitants , they have won a temporary victory. But regardless of their chicanery and ruthlessness, their are two facts that are undeniable that will always make any deception based rule of the few over the many unstable. 1 . The masses must ultimately believe their lives are improving as the belief that you can forever muzzle and chain a population is a false theory, as the 20th Century taught us, Hitler , Mussolini , Hirohito and Stalin did not win. 2. When the total mismanagement of the resources of the earth becomes greater than a critical point, the much higher non human intelligences (those natural or maybe even supernatural) simply decide the silliness by those backward Corupted few billion apes must end . I feel soon , as this plays out, that we will realise how right the ancient mythology’s and scriptures were all along. Truth will finally show, and like the dictum says, it will be stranger than fiction- namely that one we have been subjected to since World War One ended.

End of part 4.

Thank you for listening to “The Baby wants his bottle poetry inc podcast”, a creative writing and poetry project brought to by Martin Anton Smith.