Roderick McKenzie
The Empty City
It’s the empty city
That nobody knows
’Cause everything’s closed,
So what’s there to know,
And no one finds out.
In the empty city
You don’t trust anybody,
But you don’t see anyone,
So it’s easy not to trust them.
When the pavements are wet
You remember certain people.
It really is not helpful.
You don’t want a memory.
In all the big, tall buildings
Are rooms full of hoarded stuff.
No one goes there ’cause no one’s left.
So all the stuff just sits.
Cops in masks cruise in locked cars.
They never get out.
You could lie in the street for days.
Where would they take you anyway?
Everything is all closed up.
The cops can’t even get a beer,
Let alone an undertaker.
But it really doesn’t matter.
Here in the empty city, you dissolve.
The Future
So this now is the future.
No flying cars.
No solutions, all the same problems.
People are slaughtered
In huge numbers worldwide.
It will not stop.
No one finds an ending.
The very richest
Only spend to go to Mars.
They’ve got the money,
And they know Earth is so last year,
Down the toilet.
They’ll buy Mars in advance
And sell shares later,
When all our ice has melted,
And fires never stop.
Techno makes the future future.
AI takes over.
The great quantum computers,
In nanoseconds,
Enable endless scams and porno.
It’s the future,
So we have no control.
It’s done for us.
We all pay by auto-pay.
The future is secure.
The police have brand-new weapons.
Folks just vaporize.
No record, no body, no trial.
You bet it’s secret.
And there’s private security
With disease masks
All around the rich people.
Till they get to Mars
We’re not permitted to infect them.
I’ve seen the future.
I’m living in the middle of it.
Can I get a drink?
