Login
|
Join PoetrySoup
Home
Submit Poems
Login
Sign Up
Member Home
My Poems
My Quotes
My Profile & Settings
My Inboxes
My Outboxes
Soup Mail
Contest Results/Status
Contests
Poems
Poets
Famous Poems
Famous Poets
Dictionary
Types of Poems
Quotes
Short Stories
Articles
Forum
Blogs
Poem of the Day
New Poems
Resources
Syllable Counter
Anthology
Grammar Check
Greeting Card Maker
Classifieds
Member Area
Member Home
My Profile and Settings
My Poems
My Quotes
My Short Stories
My Articles
My Comments Inboxes
My Comments Outboxes
Soup Mail
Poetry Contests
Contest Results/Status
Followers
Poems of Poets I Follow
Friend Builder
Soup Social
Poetry Forum
New/Upcoming Features
The Wall
Soup Facebook Page
Who is Online
Link to Us
Member Poems
Poems - Top 100 New
Poems - Top 100 All-Time
Poems - Best
Poems - by Topic
Poems - New (All)
Poems - New (PM)
Poems - New by Poet
Poems - Random
Poems - Read
Poems - Unread
Member Poets
Poets - Best New
Poets - New
Poets - Top 100 Most Poems
Poets - Top 100 Most Poems Recent
Poets - Top 100 Community
Poets - Top 100 Contest
Famous Poems
Famous Poems - African American
Famous Poems - Best
Famous Poems - Classical
Famous Poems - English
Famous Poems - Haiku
Famous Poems - Love
Famous Poems - Short
Famous Poems - Top 100
Famous Poets
Famous Poets - Living
Famous Poets - Most Popular
Famous Poets - Top 100
Famous Poets - Best
Famous Poets - Women
Famous Poets - African American
Famous Poets - Beat
Famous Poets - Cinquain
Famous Poets - Classical
Famous Poets - English
Famous Poets - Haiku
Famous Poets - Hindi
Famous Poets - Jewish
Famous Poets - Love
Famous Poets - Metaphysical
Famous Poets - Modern
Famous Poets - Punjabi
Famous Poets - Romantic
Famous Poets - Spanish
Famous Poets - Suicidal
Famous Poets - Urdu
Famous Poets - War
Poetry Resources
Anagrams
Bible
Book Store
Character Counter
Cliché Finder
Poetry Clichés
Common Words
Copyright Information
Grammar
Grammar Checker
Homonym
Homophones
How to Write a Poem
Lyrics
Love Poem Generator
New Poetic Forms
Plagiarism Checker
Poetics
Poetry Art
Publishing
Random Word Generator
Spell Checker
Store
What is Good Poetry?
Word Counter
Email Poem
Your IP Address: 3.14.83.223
Your Email Address:
Required
Email Address Not Valid.
To Email Address:
Email Address Not Valid.
Required
Subject
Required
Personal Note:
Poem Title:
Poem
2017 - year zero They loaned to the poor, who cannot repay. They stole from the old, who cannot recover. They sold our future, for better or worse and made our children pay. They schooled arithmetic to be feared. They tutored trust in suited men. They taught the poor were lazy and spawned the idle rich from their toil. They took our precious things and sold them cheap to fake friends. They made money by printing money and delayed the reckoning. They funded phoney wars to turn our attention whilst they picked our pockets and allowed millions of strangers to die. They brainwashed faith in impotent leaders and privately castrated them. No more! Protests! Uprising! Revolution! Injustice washed away in blood. Ours and theirs and the innocent. Paradise from sacrifice. A promised land from a land of empty promises. 2020 - tech Tablet touchscreen tele-screens. Cameras watching. Knowing your location and when. Centillion search engine recording preferences and thoughts. Predictive text correcting thought crime. Denouncing. Data mining. Trending counter revolutionary memes. Finding patterns for state cauterisation. 2025 - ghost of O'Brian When the oppressed grow numb to the pain and are blind from where it comes they no longer care. Stale bread and brassy circuses are all they need to ignore the strings and pulleys and levers and trap doors that control their free will. Tyranny behind a closed curtain. An illusion of prosperity and happiness. Plastic utopia. If you want a vision of the present imagine a boot stamping on a smiling face. Forever. 2037 - preface to the 20th year newspeak dictionary - inner party edition Unlisting of ungood words complete ahead of the five year plan. Archaic terms useful for thought correction: "Overseas contingency operations" "Targeted killings" "Regime change" "Collateral damage" "Enhanced interrogation techniques" "Extraordinary rendition" "Black sites" remain in the dictionary. Their definitions unprinted. Their meanings self evident as defined by the party. Doublethink fluidity. Doubleplus good. 2054 - ministry of truth haikus Freedom's slavery. Eternal warfare's peacetime. Strengthened ignorance. Eurasia hatred. Control past, control future. Eastasia hatred. Doublethink dogma. Contradictory beliefs. Two plus two is five. 2071 - nirvana Forbidden lovers knowing their love is doomed. They are the dead. Sitting under curfewed stars. Miniluv satellites twinkling as they fly past, metallic eyes seeing everything. They look up at the face of their leader immortally blasted into the moon's surface by atomics and thought criminals. Reprogrammed to serve then scattered in a vacuum graveyard, buried in moon dust The inner party's heavenly fortress impregnable, unreachable, eternal. Its chill moonlight casting shadows against steel and concrete. They hold hands for the last time. Big Brother watching from on high. Watching them. And watching you. Notes: "If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever" is the original quote from 1984 "War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength" is the original quote from 1984 The book 1984 was so called because George Orwell wrote it in 1948 and simply switched the last two digits. In this poem I switched the last two digits of 2017 to make 2071 Tele-screens were the televisions in 1984 that were watching you "They are the dead" is a twist of the original quote "we are the dead" said by both Winston and Julia just before they were arrested "Doublethink" is the ability to hold contradictory beliefs "Miniluv" is newspeak for ministry of love, where the thought police work "Centillion" is 1 followed by 303 zeros. The centillion search engine is the party's replacement for google. Google was likewise named after a googol which is 1 followed by 100 zeros "2 + 2 = 5" is an example of dogma that the party might state as fact in 1984 "Big Brother is watching you" is the slogan on propaganda posters in 1984 Written 3rd March 2017 - or year zero Entry to "1984 or 2017" contest
CAPTCHA Preview
Type the characters you see in the picture
Required