there is a land,
in the far south,
of the peninsular Italy,
it is rugged and harsh,
hard to reach,
it’s so god damn pretty,
there are a thousand stories,
of grief and of victory,
history scars this landscape,
from here we see Sicily.
from Norman invaders,
as well as the Greeks,
huge earthquakes long ago,
has made life here bleak,
a forgotten land of Italy,
little development there,
a haphazard rail and motorway link,
seems that the government don’t care,
centuries of hardship,
the land is difficult to farm,
it’s hilly and delicate,
and I am not even an expert.
the only thing the government does,
is forget the plight of this place,
everything is so underdeveloped,
it’s a shame of our human race.
so Rome why are you killing Calabria?
do you know that honest people live there?
no work, no future only lies,
all the good stuff goes to the north, what a surprise.
so the land is riddled with mafia,
the ‘ndrangheta has grown into a beast,
it’s your fucking problem get it resolved,
let this proud region live in peace.
they ignore the plight of this population,
they don’t care what the mafia does,
they’ve destroyed so much history and beauty,
and you tell me it means nothing to you.
near Borgia almost Girifalco,
permission was given to dig a hole,
a private waste collection site,
that will be filled with poisons and toxins,
who gave this permission? Borgia and Cortale,
fast tracked also by the Regione Calabria,
documents signed and sealed in record time,
you don’t get that with urgent medical matters.
so the good people of Girifalco and Borgia,
of Cortale, Amaroni , and San Floro,
now protest with all their hearts,
they’ve already seen the landscape scarred,
with wind farms on every hill,
wind turbines growing like mushrooms,
strict laws forgotten somehow,
people protest and subsequently threatened,
strange house fires and cars explode,
people who have legally signed documents against this,
finding discrepancies in planning applications,
now fearing for his life,
he ran away to live in Naples,
is correct and delicate opinions,
made the national news.
so here we are back to the start,
another hard time to protest,
the mafia has let it be known,
which side they are on,
a huge bloody hole to fill,
with asbestos and other industrial waste,
nobody in power gives a shit,
this government is a disgrace.
breaking news from Gioia Tauro,
the largest port in Calabria,
we’ve just heard of a cargo to be unloaded,
all those chemical weapons from Syria,
again the government takes the money,
and unloads more shit on this land,
we are not a fucking sewer, Rome,
don’t you understand!
this is reality I do know things too,
and I do know the government,
does not really care about you,
Rome why are you killing Calabria?
are you ashamed it has more history than you?
are you waiting for the monuments to fall?
the Calabrian people will not stand down,
‘ndrangheta cannot kill us all,
but with toxic dumps and chemical weapons,
a whiff of genocide is on the menu today.
Rome is killing Calabria,
a sort of ethnic cleansing,
turning an area of outstanding natural beauty,
into a mass manmade graveyard,
the bastards in Rome care only of matters up north,
everything gets done quicker in Milan,
thousands of desperate families from Calabria,
have shut up shop and ran,
to Mexico,
to India,
to Africa,
to the U.K.,
and the government continues to dither.
they cannot see things any other way.
©D.Hobson January 2014
Darren Hobson Poet 