A Morning stroll in the Glow red ball of the sun through slightly overcast Day, past a park that is now overgrown with weeds, and become the neighbours dump site. Beer cans littering it where children play. Around a corner where weeds fill the gutters, past multiple sewers manhole's gaping with open mouths to swallow the unwary , their lids converted to a bottle of golden liquid to cloud the mind , of a unknown father and a destitute mother. Past forgotten potholes, and abandoned houses in various states of decays, one burnt down by a squatters fire in the winter. Down to the intersection , now an impromptu four way stop, where the regulating red, orange and green lights of a former time have been stripped away and sold to pay a tavern owner. Past the unfenced nature reserve, observing a new dwelling built with no concern for anyone's safety being added to an earlier one until the whole area of joined shacks resembles the garbage dumps of yesteryear.

The whiff of illegal substances filling the air, and the wealthy banker's son is making a trade for a taste of nirvana, so he can use illusion to replace realty. Across the road past a park where children once played , and the broken and rusted playground equipment resembles the derelicts of the local scrap yard. Now in the Shopping centre on my way , past the vacant shop of yesterday's bank , now lacking the smile of the pretty blonde's face, and memories of the front page pictures of tearful parents. Approached by the daughter of yesteryears civil servant, who was packaged and lost his future to a bankrupt financial institution, that promised returns greater than you can imagine. She was clothed in a skimpy skirt, her pupils revealed a habit that revealed the chain, she was caught in at the local rave. Across the way , a foreign visitor was watching his slave gather the gold for tomorrows package of human misery. Uniformed men patrolled the area , with the rod's of their new found authority at the ready, they were nervous , the armoured vehicle parked with engine running , ready to flee at any sign of sudden outpouring of grey lead hail. The red stain of last weeks sudden dark foreboding storm that took a companion to a place unknown, brought the fear of his soon departure, as he released the switch that kept it impotent, and held his rod of authority at the ready.

The shelves had new poster's advertising prices slightly higher than last week , yet lower than the cafe, that immigrants started and that cost the lives of the mother and her only son, and someone's brother who was being kept on life support, in a crippled frame. No longer would he rise at four in the morning to drive to the market, to provide for the local neighbourhood, collecting hot bread to adorn their breakfast table and fill the lunch boxes. Now a few rudimentary wooden tables , with plastic plates of blood red fruit replaced the shop, and cluttered the side walk.

Now with bag in hand back out past the vacant doctor's rooms who had left for other climes and the hope of a better future for his offspring, after being relieved of his luxury vehicle by a few drug crazed individuals with an order to fill for Judas who was sowing death for thirty pieces of silver. The latest news poster , spoke of a neighbouring nation , that had broken into a civil war, because its populace were starving after driving , those that filled the packets of their staple food, off the land where once wild beast had roamed. The merchants of death, now smiling with glee were supplying rods that spat fire and lead , for the remains of any wealth left in the state. Buildings that once stood proud and boasted of civilisation were now the shell holes that vagrants used to sleep amidst the sound of flying lead hail. The broken white porcelain cisterns of yesteryear bearing testimony to the alluring promise of freedom amidst the blood staining the tiled floors. A picture of the champion of liberation , with stars and ribbons and gold braid was pasted on the wall , with slogans that promised glorious freedom , to be bought by the slaughter of innocents.

The next poster promised a renaissance, to hide the mass graves of ethnic cleansing and dictators that ruled without a mandate. A promise of democracy to once proud nations, who now live in squalor and global handouts. The promise of a new day, of trade and shiny new vehicles for all. A handout house of baked clay, to replace the tin shanties surrounding the ruins of former cities that had become the dens of illicit trade. Proclaiming freedom from oppression , and the rule of intellectuals while an ally was challenging far off honourable men, to impress a mindless mob with hysteria and election fever.

Passed a street trader, unpacking his tables and chairs, made of wood, for sale to a diminishing market of once proud civil servants replaced by those of darker hue in the space of a few years. The local hospital bearing testimony, with closed wards , shortage of supplies , to its chronic lack of expertise. Foreign doctors imported , who with broken language struggled to appease the elderly who had to endure the wait of two thirds of a day , to explain their condition due to files having gone astray, not sure if the new medication would provide the relief their respected hero of yesteryear prescribed. While barricades are erected to keep the mobs of the new elite from removing the bedding and the towels to adorn their promised new homes.

On the news the unpaid vehicles that collapsed financial institutions, and deprived salesmen that gathered dust in a recovery yard were being crushed to hide the traces of those relatives that had only borrowed them without permission for a while. The files were lost , when streets were renamed and unknown cites bearing some forgotten heroes of yesteryear names could not be found on the new maps of today. The owners could not be traced for he who lived in Piet Smit street now lived in Terror street. Every one remembered Terror who had advocated the destruction of those who filled the staple food packets, but who was Piet Smit anyway. Don't worry we have new allies who advocate the destruction of an ancient nation who recently returned to their ancient homeland after being driven out for killing the Prince of Life.

They have become the financiers replacing the old colonial masters, building shrines in the cities that were once adorned with places of worship to the prince of life. In abandoned cathedrals , local herbs and animal parts are being sold to cure the ailments of those who cannot be served by the empty shelves of local clinics. Spirits are divined, and a pinch of chopped goats bladder, a little ground horn of a beast slaughtered by a poacher, and the finger nail of a gorilla should cure the sickness caused by bathing in effluent polluted stream near the new settlement in the nature reserve that stank of the contents of oft emptied bowels and bladders. Across the way a rowdy club has opened where the remnants of those that survived the destruction of their ancient city by fire, were celebrating a marriage of two who did not know if they were Artha or Martha and the adoption of some poor child abandoned by its parents , for a needle filled with delusion. Alongside is a shop full of fantasies to enlighten a depraved mind, from merchandise of various potions to stimulate dormant manhood, to pictures of bestiality and sodomy and such liberating entertainment for the affluent.

A pandemic sweeps the nations, that may have started in a similar rowdy club, where partners are often swapped , and long distance drivers and railway stewards or air flight attendants carried it to consort after consort. Till the majority of a nation had some distant connection to its source, by immeasurable couplings. Graves are filled, hospital's overflow with the hint of a memory of an ancient curse stemming back to a wooden boat and a centuries old rescuer of humanity from drowning. Those new painters of renaissance art are swift to daub some new colors on the pictures of the imagination to bedazzle the frenzied mob's alarmed by the mounting cost of human life.

Alongside the news posters is a picture of a new religionist's who by one prayer can cure any ailment known to man, swell his bank balance to unimaginable size, and provide stately houses and gleaming American dreams. All he requires is a little seed faith, so he can build a many gaudy palaces, with religious entertainment, to rival that of a larger sister organisation who also sells life assurance for a percentage of your monthly income.

While the great truths of reformers of old are abandoned for the alluring promise of heaven on earth, by a pop Idol is screened every day enticing darkened apostate minds into a utopian dream. A new millennium a age of freedom of choice, and human sovereignty, and a global village where money can be made selling the magic potions of some bard called Getafix to prolong the coming of Geriatrix, while Asterix and Obelix slay the Romans.

Is Anarchy all that remains and our only hope, or shall we soon witness the Return of the Prince of Life, for violence fills the land just like in the time of that ancient boat builder, and the arts of Cities of destruction are practised throughout the globe. Where shall we flee for refuge in the coming storm only to him who said "I am the Way , the Truth and The Life". Seek him out, ask about him , find him before it is to late.