apocalypse

The Apocalyptic Waltz

~ jim clayton ~ Leave a comment

MC:
Citizens of the World!
Industrialists! Capitalists! Boys and Girls!
Philosophers! Ecologists!
Fossil fuel apologists!
Government Committees!
Villages and Cities!
Sample if you dare the End of the World phantasies
of Dr Doom Scroll’s Cabaret of Catastrophes!
And remember!
you can always call our dedicated number
Oh Nein! Oh Nein! Six Six Six!
Or go online for TikTok clips
Talk to our team of Emeritus Professors
Tenured in Trauma, Nightmares & Terror!
They’ll fill ya with horror
The Day After Tommor
It’s really NO trouble at all….
but first!
I beg you – PLEASE!
enough with your eco-teasing!
your idiotic, zoonotic sneezing!
your endless questions and answers!
take your medication and take your partners
for the Mega Trending, Soon-to-be-Ending, Fully Syndicated, Sinfully Syncopated, the One, the Only: The Apocalyptic Waltz…!

CHORUS:
so it’s a hey ho and here we go
fire in the sky and nothing below
it’s places please
for humanity’s
Apocalyptic Waltz

VERSE:
selfies on a nuclear beach
factor fifty and gun within reach
the view’s fantastic
an ocean of plastic
gannets & turtles tied up in elastic
you close your eyes
but it’s no surprise
Apocalyptic Waltz

[…. endless versions of the same until you run out of clean water, food, the ballroom’s inundated / burned out, whatever…]

a short waltz on a beach at the end of the world

~ jim clayton ~ Leave a comment

wade naked in the water
lay dreaming by the lake
angels will blow the way to go
devils only know about snakes
so when the sun comes rolling in
and shadows steal the land

well c’mon take my hand
out on the sand
and we’ll dance our death away

I swear I’m never gonna run again
I swear I’m never gonna quit
life’s a big peach just outta reach
when you think of it
but if you say we’ll win someday
I’ll do my best, goddamn

so c’mon take my hand
out on the sand
and we’ll dance our death away

coleoptera putinidae

~ jim clayton ~ Leave a comment

The drone flies in / we’re pickin’ up Putin / shakily salutin’ / one silver bullet left for shootin’ / through his hat because his brains need rebootin’ / now he finally sees how he’s throned / king of the hill on a pyramid of bones / with a twisted medal and a mobile phone / implausibly, imperially alone / experiencing his very own / trombone moment / when he finally sees he’s his own opponent / the fatally flawed central component / of a terrifying machine / bombs, bullets and submarines / rattling obscenely / chucking out the dead, chewing up the scenery / blackening the greenery / clearing the city / completely / the Book of Revelation with a section on politics / the fifth horseman of the apocalypse / shameless & shirtless / soulless & hairless / squint like a flint and a smile like a burning necklace / but enough – it’s done / the war is over, nobody won / the last bomb dropped and the paperwork done / everyone gone / all except poor Vladimir / the cock-headed cavalier / no – Vlad’s still here / Vlad the Impaler / Vlad the Jailer / Vlad the Last Action Movie Trailer / Vlad the Nuclear Anti-Social Neighbour / who only wanted the best for his people / in attitudes positively medieval / splash of uranium, topnotes of diesel / his legacy a brutal, resilient kinda beetle / bouncing along, busily fecal / running through the ruins of an orthodox cathedral / feelers twitching amongst the rubble / on the lookout for bug-sized trouble

apocalypso

~ jim clayton ~ Leave a comment

zombies outside the shopping mall, soldiers shoot from the hip
ghosts scream round on the underground, the radioactive pipework drips
if I blunt my sense of survival, if I lose my way
I’ll chalk it up to experience and we’ll meet again some sunny day

so …. follow instruction on the TV station, panic ain’t worth a heck
we’ll put to sea on a submarine and watch the end from the deck

famine and plague in the boonies, fire & flood in the town
alien creatures with distressing features running the population down
and if I hear of resistance, I’ll be sure to send you a text
so board up your doors, conserve your stores and get ready for what comes next

and … follow instruction on the TV station, panic ain’t worth a heck
we’ll put to sea on a submarine and watch the end from the deck

asteroid on collision, virus, earthquake and worse
you won’t have a prayer come the solar flare and the poles all flip to reverse
so sorry if I sound defeatist, I try my best to be bright
but it’s hard when your yard is badly charred and the wolves are prowling at night

meanwhile … follow instruction on the TV station, panic ain’t worth a heck
we’ll put to sea on a submarine and watch the end from the deck

(play out with trumpets, steel pans, sirens &c)

bunker mentality

~ jim clayton ~ 2 Comments

The boy stood on the burning deck / a Burberry flash-guard round his neck / in a handsome, hand cut, tartan check / complementing the rest of his hi-spec / boot-flare / heat-aware / virus-retardant lounge wear

flips his goggles / toggles / through the image finder / to any form of life whatsoever / scans the horizon / his eyes widen / finding no-one and nothing with nowhere to hide in

Calls to his mother / who slowly ascends the ladder / all the way from the sleeping chamber / Darling? Don’t you remember? / she says / giving his crow-black quiff a playful mess / It’s a natural process / The poor go under and what’s left is the best / Don’t distress / yourself, darling / I know it seems alarming / but it’s a bit like farming / you wouldn’t get far / if nothing ever went to the abattoir

But mama, what happens when there’s only us? / When we’ve finally lost all the superfluous? / Who’ll be there to valet park the cars? / Wait our tables in the restaurants and bars? / Organise parties? Tailor our suits? / Craft our patent calf-skin boots? / Who’ll be there in the Dairy Queens / to envy our lives in the magazines?

Oh I’m sure they’ve got it figured out / she said, waving a silver comb about / You really are such a sensitive soul! / Rest assured it’s under control / They’ve got drones and robots to dig the holes / and keep us safe with armed patrols / It’s so sweet of you to think of the proles / Now raise the screens dear and come downstairs / We’ve set up a link with the other billionaires / It’s Sunday night! Caviar and chips! / There’ll be plenty of time tomorrow for your apocalypse

IMG_1777

full catastrophe writing

~ jim clayton ~ 2 Comments

okay /

so here I am, taking the dog out / wandering along, wondering what the hell to write about /

maybe I could vent / about the rise of the establishment / how it’s always the workers who end up getting canned / when there’s a market crash and fall in demand / and meanwhile the bosses / that engineered the catastrophic losses / get endless juicy bonuses / and other contractual phonus balonuses / january thru’ december / one long golden shower for the private members /

hmm…so I could write about that /

or maybe disasters of an environmental nature / focusing on some poor unfortunate creature / floating by the camera / with its head wedged in a bottle / or a porpoise, throttled / by a discarded net / or a million tonnes of plastic crap / from avocado cartons to bubble wrap / spreading round the world in a mantle of waste / until we’re forced to evacuate headlong into space / planet to planet, ad nauseam / the continuing adventures of homopollutiens / until a higher being unexpectedly descends / in a whirl of stars, saying fuck it / cleans us all up with a cosmic mop & bucket

so I could write about that /

or Brexit Britannia, up on a plinth / of takeaway cartons and 5% mince / in her left hand, a trident of tourist tack / in her right a riot shield union jack / and curled at her feet a monstrous dog / the head of Boris Johnson, the arse of Jacob Rees-Mogg

but I don’t know

maybe I’ll just settle for the usual guff / about the end of time and all that stuff / sinkholes, tsunamis, day after tomorrow shit / the sun disappearing, and me along with it / sucker-punched to eternity / (which of course passes instantly / because if I’m dead how on earth could I tell ya’ / if I’ve been dead five minutes or five millennia?) / anyway / fast forward to judgement day / the celestial finger beckoning / for the dead to come forward for the final reckoning / the graves of the world gaping wide / slowly revealing what’s buried inside / iphones numberless lighting up as one / catching up on updates a’trillion / and god stamps, and swears, and tugs his beard / and shouts Goddammit! this is so fucking weird / you know – I thought it’d be more spiritual than this / not just phone zombies taking the piss / so he slams the lid shut on the apocalypse / and settles back down to watch kitten clips /

or something