Wax And Wane Comments

Nice poem about the poor and rich

I agree with your thoughts on poverty and riches. How could I not? A photo that is just right and so true. In my country, the media fawn over wealthy people, producing 'rich lists' from time to time- never poor lists. I think that wealthy people, like Bill Gates and Charles Heeney, who give away large sums of money to charity and the poor, are the admirable ones. You can be very wealthy, and still be a good person.

So very real and powerful! This is a very nice piece of poetry and many kudos. Ever grateful and thankful to you for our collaboration Fabrizio. I never forget. I am so swamped with projects that I did not find time to write anything worthwhile about the new poetic undertaking of yours. Next time. God bless you. Lots of hugs from Athens. Cheers!

thank you for sharing this lovely poem. This inequality is a growing cause of anger and distrust felt by more and more people. Though the problem is many sided and tackling it will need some new thought process and hard and sincere work but raising voice against it is as important as any this else. And it is the responsibility of all able to speak or write about it.

The vast gap between the rich and poor, when a section of people are in so much luxury and do not know what to do with their property while other section are dying due to poverty, not getting two meals a day, no shelter, no clothes.no education, no medicine, it is really a shame on humanity.It is also a challenge before the civilized society to make equitable distribution of wealth, to lessen the gap between rich and poor, between developed countries and developing countries.Thanks Fabrizio making us a call on this issue with your poem to ponder and draw attention of major players who can bring about a change and find a solution

Thank you for your beautifully written poem; love especially, I don't know what it means to actually save This present time and any possible future. futility; awareness, but futility... It was easier to identify causes and effects of Terrorism, but when I began to ponder poetry for our Inequality e-book, it seemed to come out so slick, pat, and obvious. Wrote a poem called Billions for poemhunter, but am still not satisfied. Can't seem to find the emotional roots, so I became sarcastic, self-congratulatory, that I already knew the problems. Ox-Fam seems to have at least some of the solutions. So I guess it is the Poets role to define the problem for the unknowing. Thanks for allowing me to ramble.....Marianne Larsen Reninger

The conversations and comments on the poem prove not only the importance of the problem faced but, the more important, that there are consciences to undertake the struggle for a better future deserving to mankind.Poems like this play the leading role.

Α note more.Your poem here, dear Fabrizio, encourages me to translate into eng. a poem of mine in the form of revilutionary paian about the fight to be undertaken in this very century against the great differences between rich and poor In this very struggle a tributee will be to translate your poem here too.

I hurry up- before reading all the interesting comments- to drop a word of admiration for the poem.Poesy has played a great role in history in awakening consciences and this poem here of Fabrizio with its warmth of sensitiveness can play such a role.Pandora's present may change -with poems like that- conditions described in Mourillio's painting.

II. The number of people whose wealth is equal to that of the poorest half of the world’s population since 2010: 2010: 388 2011: 177 2012: 159 2013: 92 2014: 80 2015: 62 Wealth of 1%,50%, and 99% taken from Credit Suisse Global Wealth Datebook (2013 and 2014) The wealth of the richest 62 was calculated using Forbes’ billionaires list. Annual data taken from list published in March. Calculations include negative wealth (i.e. debt) . As a robustness check, Oxfam recalculated the wealth share of wealth held by the richest 1 percent once negative wealth is excluded. It did not change significantly (falling from 50.1 percent to 49.8 percent) . Negative wealth as a share of total wealth has remained constant over time, such that wealth distribution trends over time are not affected. GO TO OXFAM.org web page to: - Download the report: 'An Economy for the 1%' - Add your name, and let’s end the era of tax havens.

I POST HERE AN INTERESTING EXCHANGE OF MAILS WITH PAMELA: PAM: I agree with you that there is a propensity for both good and evil inside of man, both individually and collectively. However, we also have the ability to reason, to learn from our mistakes and to progress in multiple and varied ways as a society. That all said, we are all working towards death, and we all have demons to combat. When you write that our ‘unending spiral’ cannot be stopped, I have to ask: [..] we also have the ability to reason, to learn from our mistakes and to progress in multiple and varied ways as a society. MY REPLY: - yes, sure, we have such ability, but the individual micro-cosmo is quite different from the larger 'cosmo' [our society (-ies) / the mankind's macro-cosmo]. Societies evolve in even more sophisticated, complex Cultures, but also disappear.. Just give a look at mankind's past.. PAM: “Do you have any hope for mankind? ” MY REPLY: - I have a pessimistic nature, but want to hope that mankind will find a way to survive.. As in Hesiod write, 'HOPE' was the only one left inside Pandora's jar, after she had all our 'evils' released.. wasn't it? ;) PAM: [..] make the world a better place? MY REPLY: - how? we've started a new epoch, 'anthropocene', putting all our planet's ecosystems at risk.. And there are already more than 7 billions human beings on planet Earth (I guess we're close to 7,4 billion, while we were c.6 billions at the end of 1999!) .. You see, we'd need a real 'miracle'.. but can Science do it? through science, in duly time, we could surely change our world in a better place.. Yet, 'science' is the necessary ingredient but is not 'sufficient'.. We should have (all mankind, I mean) common and wise politics, able to envisage and build - year after year - a fair and safe future for all.. On the contrary, as Oxfam report says, Instead of an economy that works for the prosperity of all, for future generations, and for the planet, we have created an economy for the 1%. It's a fact that a few thousand people can decide about which politics have to be implemented, so to especially 'help' just a fraction of the Humanity, not all Mankind. There was an article on the NYT, not long ago (beginning of Jan.) , detailing such a situation in the US. PAM: What do you hope to accomplish by taking witness in your poetry to terrorism, inequality, war, violence? MY REPLY: - the little I try/manage to do, is for my conscience, first... then, keep doing something (hopefully, 'good') , I also hope to help some of those I can reach to achive a better understanding of what is at stake.. PAM: Can we count the small victories as well as the big ones (e.g. Poets United Across the World modelling positive relations and respect?) ? MY REPLY: yes, we can count our little victories (if they are such) , because it is only this way (through a long-long list of little 'victories') that we can hope to gain something 'big' (but I'm sceptical about how big: probably not enough to change the world) . PAM: [..] we can also cite improvements overall in the world. I.E. it is much better to be a human living right now than 100 years ago MY REPLY: I think it's sort of a myth. For sure many can say that we are living in a better world, today. It is true for many of us, human beings. But not for all. There are billions of human beings that don't have what we have. Not even a fraction of what we have. And hundreds and hundreds million of other human beings don't have even enough to eat! Such sheer inequality means that there are more poor in the world nowadays than they were at the end of XIX century, when less than 2 billion human beings lived on planet Earth. PAM: What propels this knowledge to action, to behavior, to changes in attitudes, begins with consciousness raising…Is this what you are saying? MY REPLY: This time I can answer with a simple Yes :) Consciousness raising and taking responsibility. To finish this sort of 'essay' (and I ask your pardon for this long reply) , I can add, to the other points above, that just now the world is dealing with an unprecedented refugee crisis (the worst since WWII) . And if we don't stop this terrible climate change [welll, I think we can't stop it, but only slow it down in some degree] we will have even more refugees, because people will have to flee from deserts that are growing or from lowlands by the sea because of flooding.. At the end, the real point is that we, taken as a whole, can't act according to 'reason'. Meaning: we think about what we can get in the short term, as we - too often - follow just our lowest desires and our greed.. We don't think about the long term impact of our choices on our society and on the planet Earth (= our sole home) .. At the end, as you see, it's all about taking responsibility. Fabrizio

Dear Fab, yes, it's the reality of so called humanity.. unfinished end. thanks for your great job

I'm internalizing your poem that discusses the state of our world with regard to the super rich and the very poor as defined by wealth. The style of the writing is quite a departure from your other work. I like the new approach. It's good to mix things up. I also enjoyed reading Galina Italyanskaya's response. People are responding and thinking. Me included. How exciting to come home to a new poem!

THANK YOU, dear Gale!

Indeed Fabrizio, greed is what ultimately leads to destruction.. Our world used to be a lot better before we all turned too greedy...

A brilliant read.. I really admire the fact that you take up an issue so 'violent' and 'complicated', if I dare call them, and turn them into pure poetry without ever reducing the importance and gravity of those issues.. I love this one aspect of all your poems, it just shows your maturity and and poetic genius.. 'Grazie di core' for sharing this poem Fabrizio sir.. And indeed this is an issue that is really troublesome, particularly due to the fact that the ones who suffer the most due to this gap between earnings are newborn babies and children.. Every baby, every child deserve a bright childhood, but the system with its discrimination puts those children into a tragic life robbed of a childhood...

This is a lovely eye opener to the mass.During last so many centuries, this process is going on - Rich is getting richer and poor becoming poorer And riches are feeling proud. I feel that this is the main reason of degradation of values of individuals and deterioration of human society. Until it is arrested or curbed no other step can improve our human society all over the globe. Thanks for sharing this burning issue.

This work should be encouraged to be witnessed by a larger audience than what we have on ph...this poem will really endear our friend here Frosini to the heart of the poors...yet, it's a shame, i do not see the sad trend changing soon...! a fair-thought from an upright mind! Great work here

Like ash carried off by the wind! ! But, i have a purpose in life. Nice work.

This poem certainly encourages us to think, first of our own situation and secondly take a good look around and see with our own eyes. I like to think that everyone is equal, unfortunately the world doesn't work that way and whether we like it or not, we are all placed into our own status. I love poems that speak reality and tell it like it is.....