Even As We Hyper-Consume

Even as we sit in our happy little homes utterly warm and comfortable

many more squat quite hopeless on hardpacked dirt floors

Even as we concentrate fully upon our surreal consumption

well over a billion live on unable to afford even the basics

Even as our own vast health care choices grow ever more costly

others need not pay for that which is not even offered

Even as some of us grow wiser about the food that we eat

some eat the wild animals that can never be replaced

Even as we struggle to manage the tattered remnants of our forests

many walk miles just to cut and carry their own daily firewood

Even as we spend ever more on our hi-tech weapon systems

Our greatest enemies cannot afford shoes for their feet

Even as we stand thoughtless in a hot and steamy shower

teenage mothers carry filthy water to their sickly children

Even as we despoil with concrete and bulldozers

others use hand axes, fire and goats to gain their own advantages

Even as we casually cast our fast food wrappers out upon the roads

millions make a crude living by combing through garbage

Even as our loving mothers shepherd children safely inside locked mini-vans

starving babies suck with empty eyes at dusty and desiccated breasts

Even as we grow bored and find no meaning in our lives

Dirty and hungry hordes consider no more than their next meal

Even as our monstrous SUVs thirstily guzzle the dregs of the oil as we drive all alone

they have no power, sewers, running water, cars or <gasp> even television

Even as we discard decent clothes merely for fashion's fickle sake

others cut their footwear from the remnants of old tires

Even as we indulge in communal botoxification

infants die in the desert with flies in their eyes

Even as we lavish thousands upon the care of our pets

children in their schools do not get even our used eyeglasses

Even as we prepare to suck the oil from our last wild places

we council the less-fortunate to leave their own rain forests intact forever

Even as we deplore their sick & irrational religious fanaticism

our cause remains righteous because the one true God is on our side

Even as we imprison them as unlawful combatants

we attack them and kill them quite against the rules we invented ourselves

Even as we constantly preach about the value of sweet freedom

they must choose to be either with us or be counted among our hated enemies

Even as the tender buds emerge in the gentle rain

the unholy diesel fumes blacken the lungs of our precious children

Even as we grow fatter, feedlot-style, on factory corporate sludge

too many others share our castoffs with the rats and the roaches

Even as we proudly disdain the need to read and to write

the ruling 1% finds it easier to pass off even more twisted & unsubstantiated half-truths

Even as world opinion grows ever stronger with regard to our actions

we grow yet more righteous and even less empathetic

Even as we prepare to spend more on the military each and every year

many children supposedly safe at home dose on mercury, lead and diesel

Even as our leaders preach of security and prosperity

their corporate cronies cut benefits and move both production & design overseas

Even as they urge pay cuts, layoffs and pension eliminations,

executives get more of everything, come profit or come loss

Even as they embrace you with false smiles and promises of a grand future

their earlier work left you out of their plans and alone on the street

Even as our blessed children loll like fattening swine upon our couches

we continue spending more money that we have not yet even earned

Even as our grasping fingers clutch at last at the marketers prize

there remain but few traces of our folly in the ash underfoot

Even as in May the young calf happily nudges his mother in the meadow

the feedlots & slaughterhouses prepare a place for him come the Fall

Even as we joyfully celebrate that Friday finally came again

we are already awaking to a depressive and smoggy Monday morning

Even as we look forward to the quiet contemplation of a dignified retirement

we actually just grow older without grace or respect and in fear

Even as the day draws to a close and the quiet shadows stir

there is still time for more noise and room to belch acrid smoke

Even as the tourist industry produces more fun every year

the things that they pimp become worn out and cannot be recycled

Even as the church bells peal out across quiet township sunsets

somewhere criminals are callously stealing pensions from trusting widows

Even as we summon up the best from within us for our greatest effort

our sociopathic so-called leaders demand young lives before they can know any better

Even as the quiet waters flow through boreal forests without end

Our mere survival smears more brown deserts around this blue-green planet

Even as honest tradesmen strive to do the good thing every day on every job

greedy salesmen cackle as they waste their fat commissions on foolish baubles

Even as we calculate the billions of light years known to the universe so far

we do not even nearly comprehend the incredible shortness of our vapid lives