Wongawongaland

by Tom Pickard

Doctor Gobbles wants to stop the jobless
quaffing from his gissy goblets
and break their backs
on the rock of his salvation.

He serves a cold buffet of hot wars
to pump-up the economy for further plunder
and squanders young lives
like bankers on a junket.

If he hung the hungry he’d hang the anger out,
incentivise to fuck off and die
or just have a jousting match
of polite poetries.

Once they bled themselves for a cure
now they only bleed the poor

Poem first published in Poets for Corbyn, published in 2015 by Pendant Publishing.

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About the Author:

Tom Pickard’s latest collection, Winter Migrants, was published by Carcanet in 2016. His ‘Ballad Of Jamie Allan’ published by Flood Editions (Chicago) was a finalist in the National Book Critics Circle Awards in 2008. He has written librettos and lyrics for musicians and composers.