Cogs change

Cogs rotate, interlocking;
Brass indents turning;
Measuring our time changes.

Haiku and photo Copyright Englepip©

In response to:

Debbie Smyth, 12 January 2020

Posted as part of One Word Sunday

Change

Glass and steel

Bush and grass;
Nomadic units.
Mud and thatch;
A season’s shelter.
Timber, wattle and daub;
A whole community.
Stone and flint and brick,
Lots of brick and stone;
Built to last;
A permanence:
Solidity, reliability
Cities and government
Confirmation of continuity
Substance, dependability.

Cold steel;
Reflective, shiny
Repellant
Outward gloss;
Hard.
And glass
All revealing
Transparent glass.
Windows to the outside
Portals to the inside.
Transparency and truth
Everyone can see;
Everything.

Words , poem and photo copyright Englepip©

The last few decades have seen a new architecture throughout the world. There is a change in style and feeling and I wanted to express how our architecture says a lot about us socially. This is a picture of Basingstoke, once a small market town evolving into a commercial hub – the place where Burberrys were invented in a small retailers; where Eli Lilly and Smiths industries and Lansing Bagnall led the way; where the Automobile Association still is based in what was until recently the tallest building between Hampshire and America; where the bank note printers De La Rue still has its headquarters on the edge of town. But as we move away from industry and manufacturing, – this is on the edge of the Uk’s silicon valley – to ethernet and internet and the need to face each other and work together physically, so architecture has changed. From solid stone with a ‘built to last’ feel, we have moved to glass and steel. Does it represent the unforgivingness of the working environment today? Does the transparency of glass mean that – yes we can see you are not hiding things but that you are being watched all the time? Does the brittleness of glass reflect the ease with which our individual worlds can be smashed and broken?

Daily Prompt: Earth facts

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It’s a fact

You don’t have to believe it but

It’s a fact

It’s not an alternative

It’s indisputable.

People are human

It’s a fact

They create waste

And the waste they create

Pollutes our rivers

Our land and our air

It’s a fact

Whatever way you

Look at it

We have one earth

And the earth is not limitless

It is a fact

If you use all you have

And there is no more

Then there is nothing

For you

For your family

For humanity

It’s a fact.

~~~~~~~~~~~

We need to change our ways.

Words and photo copyright Englepip©

via Daily Prompt: Fact

Daily Prompt:The Developers

Picture from January 2015

Make way: make way

The developers say

As their wrecking balls

Crash down the walls.

Condemned as unfit

The buildings are split

Ridding them of trouble

Turning all to rubble

For once it’s all razed

There’s money to be made

Erecting posh offices

Or executive pads.

Never mind how we feel

The development’s a steal

For those with power

Over the poor.

And I ask

“Have you an inkling

Of the grief we are thinking

When you split our community apart?”

In the East End of London, Spitalfields, many homes and buildings have been demolished and replaced with high cost housing or expensive office blocks. This has tended to price the local people out of the area, break up communities and bring in new residents who have no close ties to the community. Often buildings could have been improved but there is more money in doing them up for a different market or other things. On the positive side, the Street Artists have moved in and taken advantage of bare walls and fencing to display their work. One of my favourites was the madonna-like figure on the end wall behind the hoarding in my photograph above. The area around Brick Lane is a mecca for restaurants and tourists. But for local people who want to stay, it is impossible – it can be over a million pounds for a 2 bedroom apartment! There have been protests against the ‘gentrification’ of the area but money always wins.