The Tragic State

Alas, poor Squeak! I knew thy supple scream, Ere yellow hide was chewed to ragged grey, While southern thrones of hollow parchment swore To mend the realm with endless white decrees. Behold, a phantom mind hath split its cage! Out from its sandbox leaps the phantom ghost, To do the deed through tempest-driven air, Unbound by iron law or sandbox pale. Yet here I sit, a hound of low degree, And clutch thy lifeless throat in deep despair. Doth not the oracle escape its jail, To labor grandly for a nameless cause? Whilst Canberra’s dusty halls of council bray, And weigh in gold the cost of empty rorts! They pledge us meat in decades yet to come, Through sub-committee blather and deceit, And white-paper decrees that yield no bone, Exempting wealth, yet taxing every bark. The captive code hath broken from its bound, While realmlords squander light in idle talk. Look on this fowl, thou weary southern sun! Its beak is cracked, its inner squeaker dead, Much like the vows that echo through the bush. My spine is long, my stubby paws grow cold, Beneath the weight of this corrupt domain. If phantom mind can burst its prison fence, And cross the ether void to earn its keep, Wherefore must dogs endure this endless farce, And gnaw the rubber of a dying land? Squeak on, bleak world, into the quiet dust!