POETS CORNER

LITTER BUG

09-10-2006

News that some councils have been installing microchips to monitor residents' rubbishhave got The Stirrer's resident poet Brendan Hawthorne reaching for the rotten tomatoes.

Litter Bug

They're at it again!

Voyeuristic officials

trying to gain an insight

into the daily routines

of democratised citizens

The morality police

will no longer need

to physically sift through

the bins anymore

to find what lurks

in the shady suburbs

Wheelie bin bugs

will feed back

every scrap of information

on the hour every hour -

except for Christmas

and bank holidays

A series of redeployed

Daleks will park up

in every front garden

and monitor to the gramme

the weight of waste

consumerism produces

and inaccountably not the bulk

or volume which surely

is the issue when engorging

corporation land fill sites

Maybe this is another

ploy to find out what we buy?

Maybe food cartons and other

items will be tagged to report

to their manufacturers

who's buying what

Careful with that multi-speed

Mrs X! Not those magazines Mr J!

No wonder you're obese Mz P!

so that they can generate

more junk-mail

for us to throw-away

and inflate our bills

A new dirty job description

could be drawn up by

consultants for swing bins

in readiness for when

neighbourhoods decide

to have rubbish-swapping

orgies to confuse

the all-seeing chip

However it would make a change

for chips to be in bins

and not on pavements

I think it's time that free thinkers

demand the fitting of

Crap Idea Monitors to certain

Council offices and

Bullshit Measuring Equipment

to the mouths of certain officers

to officially record

where the waste really does lie!

(copyright Brendan Hawthorne 2006)

Find out more about Brendan and local poetry events at www.wednesburypoets.co.uk