lockdown – Comments on The Nature of the Universe

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There is no lockdown here.

Cascades of bluebells pour unrestrained down slopes and banks in teeming armies. They crowd thick and close and unrepentant, in teeming armies, nodding to kiss and touch the air, the sunlight, their neighbours. bluebells2020b

Black, loping St, Mark’s flies dangle above the bluebells, lost in the still air that’s full and fragrant and intoxicating. Bees softly hum, preoccupied, beyond concern, without anxiety. Birdsong surrounds us, meshing into the stillness and silence till it becomes part of it. Woodpecker nestlings can just be heard, grumbling in nest holes in elderly trees.

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The wood breathes deeply, unmasked, unshielded. Stitchwort and purslane gather together, jostling around stumps and falling branches, pink, white and all the shades between, small exuberant stars in a sky of riotous blue.

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Humans are few, and we are all quiet. We greet each other in joy and friendliness, as if to apologise for the distance we must put between us. A young woman walks slowly, murmuring quietly to her baby who peers out in wonder from its sling. A small girl is carried in her father’s arms. Both gaze silently, smiling.

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Another world is possible.

Another world is here.

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Radio voices infiltrate
Birdsong, and the low murmur of bees.
They demand our patience,
Promise clever plans, speak wistfully of
Getting back to normal.

Cold winds
Have blown the smog from the skies,
Hushed the traffic, sombrely
Slowed the world down.
With neighbours and friends afar,
We swap and share: seeds, favours, produce,
Recipes, ideas and goodwill.

Oh, but, the radio voices cry,
That won’t be forever. The economy
Will erupt again amid chattering smokescreens,
Rise and fill the air with busy-ness,
Drown out birds and kindness.
Don’t despair. The economy
Will get back on its rotten track.

We’re not to worry. There’s no need
For co-operation, self reliance or hope.
They’ll feed us bread and circuses again. Meanwhile,
Have some crumbs
From the great loaf of capitalism.

No need for questions,
but they’ll give us answers, anyway;
Answers we don’t need to understand,
Data to depress, figures to make us fear
Those cold winds of change.

Let’s not go back to that normal
Of duped dependency, petrified inequality
And the averted gaze.
Swallows have returned. With eyes wide open
We can see the season changing.

I wrote this in response to the Common Weal #everythingmustchange campaign (https://commonweal.scot/rebuild).

Tag: lockdown

May 2020: The Bluebell Wood in Lockdown