Outlook (Poem)

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                                                         The Caribbean Is One Nation.
The Poet's Corner
Outlook

It is dark in here
Outlook next year
My greatest fear
Is how will I fair

Post-script, prescript
I write, you write
However, tell me
Where is the light?

My side, your side
I guide, you guide
Who is to say?
Who knows the way?

Wondering, wandering
Pondering, pandering
Guessing and stressing
Struggling and failing

Three thousand and counting
Huge debt and mounting
Whose claim to fame?
Who is to blame?

Not me, it is you
Remember you did it too
Voted out, voted in
Same thing, same sin

Arguing and blustering
Debating and fussing
Bickering and battering
I hurting and lacking

Economizing, accounting
Politicking and doubting
Fooled me, fooled you
I seeing red, you blue

Promised better tomorrow
Free from pain and sorrow
Narrowly won the election
Now whole scale abjection



Downturn and recession
Giveaways and concessions
Leadership and obsession
Politicians and possessions

Global economy blamed
Excuse becoming lame
Lesser countries bounce back
Barbados, bottom of the pack

Insurance, no assurance
Management and decadence
Clientele of no importance
Executives’ self-indulgence

Downgrades, no upgrade
Disinvest and no aid
Standards and Poor
Moody and more

Prayer vigils engaged
Hell’s demons enraged
Prosperity recedes
Dishonesty impedes

Young ones crying
Parents pleading
No work, no job
No corn, just cob

The extent undisclosed
The vulnerable exposed
Families in disarray
May Day, May Day

What consolation
Before Christmas vacation
Thousands will go
Who? We don’t know

Many on the breadline
Job possibilities decline
No chance of hiring
No lack of firing

The opposition debate
Too little too late
This situation I hate
Tell me am I an ingrate?
Once it was all right
Now check my plight
Not much will to fight
Cannot see the light

The rich getting richer
The poor getting poorer
The sore getting sorer
The low getting lower

Removed the subsidy
From education tertiary
Must pay full subscription
For University tuition

Tourist arrivals down
Tourists refusing to come
To the island in the sun
Less laughter, less fun

Agriculture suffering
Farmers imploring
Manufacturing decreasing
Productive sectors ceasing

An opportunity let slip
That of entrepreneurship
Promised help never arrived
Few of these ever survived

Vulnerabilities, Complexities
Anxieties and trivialities
Uncertainties, abnormalities
These are my realities

Hear some tell
All will be well
Unable to buy, nothing to sell
Barbados, here I dwell

It is dark in here
Outlook next year
My greatest fear
Is how will I fair


Stewart Russell © 2013


Stewart Russell is an educator.

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