Wasteland 2022 Poem by Mary Champion

Morning dawns grey and unwelcoming.
Like automata they rise and prepare for their duties.
Dull-eyed, they shuffle along the shabby streets.
Purposeless - they mindlessly follow instruction.
Directionless - they give no thought to their destination.
Numbly - they live and make their uncaring way
towards the grave.

Hopeless, helpless, utterly powerless,
they have long stopped believing they could change anything -
even their clothes or their minds.
Stupefied by a diet of lies,
they no longer question.
They make no plans -
they have no future to plan for.
The trivia that masquerades as entertainment
no longer attracts their attention.
Their amputated souls shrivel around them.
Soon the icy blast of winter will scatter them across the wilderness.

This is the wasteland a century on.