John P Matthew on Writing, Book Reviews, and the Writing Life!

Where Giant Mushrooms Grow!

(Written after seeing a Discovery documentary about a field in Nevada, USA, where they test the latest weapons of mass destruction)

In Nevada there is a field where giant mushrooms grow
One mile high and two miles wide, they say on the show
That’s where they test how to vaporize people and flesh
By splitting and fusing atoms and start the world afresh.

A new era, a new definition, with the nuclear shield
Dawned with huge mushrooms grown on Nevada fields
Can erase whole cities, no need for guns or battle tanks
Tomorrow’s wars, the voice says, will be fought without ranks.

They are making bullets and missiles with lasers
That can picture the enemy, see in the dark, and subdue angers
Soldiers of the future don’t have to die for their country’s glory
They use their Global Positioning bullet, that’s another story.

Agree with me, don’t dissent, fall in line futile windmill tilters
Your wars are lost before you even see victory, dissenters
No more carpet and saturation bombing and damnation ally
They have no time to negotiate it’s you or them, you have to die.

They say their soldiers are smart weapons, they see in the dark
Their bullets can pierce armor; they can blast your flimsy mark
Where were you soldiers of the mind, intellectual, I mourn
When from your ceaseless toils such Frankensteins were born?

No more carpet and saturation bombing and damnation ally
They have no time to negotiate it’s you or them, you have to die.