it’s like a ghost town now
& O the distant hills

are a more ghostly blue
than before

now even a few stray locals
come & go stranger even now
than they were before &

O the dear police cars patrol
with speakers are more ghostly too

& through my bedroom window
the gable ended stone house wall
grows evermore iconic faces

than before even now
as daily the days flock by
more than before now even now

strange fruit in the wet market
a vampire kiss
human blood human meat

but save the economy not the ecology
surveillance surveillance surveillance

monitor our sick brains
& bury the remains in silicon valley
until hyssops burst through

the green embedded
fissures of our padded cells
& the pavements crack beneath

save the insects death to pesticide
save the world with clay balls
like caryatides we bear alms to our own epitaphs

the hours of the street endure their empathy
with landscapes ordered from the abettoir
cockroach traffic cockroach computers

user friendly amplify & invade degrade
habitats “exotic wildlife threatens humans”
population growth summons armament