A poem to the silly, wretched, foolish country I love
I love this sunburnt country
where a dissolution double
gets a new prime minister
into double trouble.
I love this silly country
where the Census fails to count;
where a Senate full of Paulines
make double troubles mount.
Where a PM’s foolish tactic
hands us over to a Hanson,
whose political galahs
hold Parliament to ransom.
Oh, what a wretched country
that leads us down a road
to Abu Ghraib in Darwin,
to kids Guantanamo’d.
Oh, what a kindly country:
when fleeing fear and fire,
your welcome’s warm embrace?
“Stop the boats!” and razor wire.
Can you love a bloody country
where the churches (this is strange)
protect the perps and not the victims?
It’s time for primate change.
I love the lovely country
of Streeton, Roberts, Rees.
The landscapes that they painted?
Let’s bulldoze all the trees.
(And is it really moral
to dump crap
on all the coral?)
I love this bloody country,
where our “man of steel” man
sent us on a killing spree
in Iraq, Afghanistan.
The coalition of the killing:
Bush and Blair and Howard.
Who cares about WMDs?
The last one in’s a coward.
(I admire a plucky nation
that at the top of its breath
sings a foreign anthem
as it charges their valleys of death.)
I love a foolish nation
where Abbott’s Forrest Gump
is turfed by a Prone Minister
as inept as Donald Trump.
He sought to rule Australia
from its Canberrean palace
only to drink bitter Bollie
from a poisoned chalice.
Fumble, stumble, tumble.
Poor Malcolm, he careens
twixt same-sex marriage
and worthless submarines.
So many problems all at once;
Rudd, GST or ISIS,
or Panama or S&P,
another blundered crisis.
“What’s the latest problem?
What could be the answer?
I try to be like Fred Astaire
but I’m a lousy dancer.”
(It isn’t over till the lady sings,
and Tony’s waiting
in the wings.)
We grieve for Mr Harbourside,
so urbane and so breezy.
It wasn’t meant to be like this.
Life was meant to be easy.
The Australian HERE
Phillip Adams, The Australian
