Colin F. Jones

FREEDOM

~ 1 ~

You cannot understand freedom lest you have been a slave,
or you have spent a life time living in a gloomy little cave.
Freedom won by fathers is not the freedom claimed by sons
if it is a freedom that is defended by the brandishing of guns.
True freedom resides in people who are loyal to themselves,
to family and to friends where ever dignified logic dwells.
Tis not the state that grants us liberty, it is the will of us all
to stand up for ourselves and speak out though we may fall.
It is not borne in self promotion of the individual and his talk
who tries to sell his ego as a Dove when he’s a Hawk.
It needs not flying flags and long years of learning trends;
it is not a sense of arrogance on which serious doubt depends,
but is the soul’s unfolding petal; a serene spiritual sense of peace
shared by basic needy people who this wondrous globe do lease.

~ 2 ~

Freedom is drinking water from an unpolluted source,
the plucking of a flower without a feeling of remorse.
It is the full feeling in the belly having eaten something good,
and knowing that the love you feel is fully understood.
Freedom is not won on battle fields by slaughter and disgust;
it is won from loving people who are prepared to trust,
prepared to give and take and above all to share,
not based on all the greed and hype; the falseness everywhere.
We rob ourselves of freedom as we rob it from the tree,
from the bison and the kangaroo, from the rivers and the sea.
We claim freedom from destruction, division, and false pride,
and claim that for sweet liberty our withered soldiers died.
On our isolated rocks we can boast of freedom there,
all manacled to our illusions, our politics, and welfare.

~ 3 ~

If there is one place on this earth where liberty can’t reach,
then freedom is but a word that affluent individuals preach.
For all of us are people, not just Americans and Brits,
all with the will to speak out loud and put it where it fits.
We are all brothers and sisters, we are earthlings every one,
all fragile frightened people, when all is said and done,
who really need each other; the love each can provide,
that brings respect and tolerance and kills off evil pride.
If you think you represent freedom from your isolated rock,
where you sit all smug and arrogant, and other systems mock,
then you are part of the system that will bring your nation grief,
for you undermine its soul and the spirit of its belief.
You will cause it to malfunction lest you extend your loving hand,
to those you think are lesser folk; those you don’t understand.

~ 4 ~

You pay for every single thing you think you possess;
you cannot walk out in the street unless you are dressed.
You cannot even shit and pee nor choose where you can sit;
you are charged to enter national parks and to travel you pay a bit.
You obey signs and directions every minute of your day,
and breathe polluted air as you move along your way.
You pay rates or rent for living in a place you call home,
and pay for your conversations on the telephone.
You are forced to put on uniforms to be told what to do
and you live or die on battlefields regardless of your view.
You are a servant of abeyance, to your teachers, and your God,
and you parrot their elusions as through temporary life you plod.
Oh yes you are free so long as you do as you’re told,
and have the pennies in the pocket so you can rave when you get old.

~ 5 ~

You are followed by the cameras everywhere you go,
and when you leave the store, all your private bags you show.
Your car is marked for parking longer than the sign allows,
as you line up in the bank queue like a herd of milking cows.
If you have the money you can do just as you please,
gobble pot and honey in the world of crime and sleaze.
But if you are just a person who wants to live his life,
then you have got a lot of problems and a lot of bloody strife.
You’ll be frowned upon by neighbours if you are different to them,
and looked upon as animals that should be living in a pen,
If you happen to be an atheist, a coloured man, or worse,
praising your country’s president when the rest of them curse.
Oh yes, this thing called freedom is surely something to behold,
Liberty they call it… mmm… I guess I must be getting old!

~ 6 ~

When we had no place to live in no house and no home,
we built a simple lean too with hessian ripped where it was sown,
We gathered from the countryside, corrugated iron and some wood,
and built a leaky roof but mostly it was pretty good.
We lived on wild lemons and oranges and plumbs,
and washed our clothes together in empty petrol drums.
We had no lights or radio; our beds were on the ground
where it was damp and cold at night; but still we slept sound.
I walked miles to the township just to get a loaf of bread,
while the f-----g people stared at me as if I did not have a head.
All lovely Christian people with stupid silly leering grins,
lost in their own allotments behind the stubble on their chins.
What I did not realize then was that it was freedom that I had,
while they were manacled to their bigotry; and that I thought was sad.

~ 7 ~

Preach not to me of freedom for it is something you’ve never won.
Unless you’ve been without it you wouldn’t even know it was gone.
If you have never suffered prejudice, been an outcast on the street,
if you have never suffered malnutrition after days of naught to eat,
then curb your tongue, and wash your eyes that they may somehow see
that what you have is harp and hype, but it is not living free.
Your freedom is a fantasy – your liberty is a joke,
you may not be tied to British Kings, but you are still tethered to a yoke.
The lowliest people on this earth are about as free as you can get
but in being free they understand it is something to regret.
For always big brother’s shadow is cast across their way
for they must, for the lives they live, for someone else’s freedom pay.