The last 24 hours threw up (yet) another dollop of doom and gloom; or was it the last 60 years... Anyway, here it is, dedicated to the many heroes and heroines I know who go through life with a pretense of normality while battling demons...

ILLUSIONS OF NORMALITY

Buds on the trees and bees begin to swarm
The daffodils defy the passing storm
Feels like the springs of not so long ago
Yet nothing's quite like I used to know.

The milk is plastic and the float as well
No clink of glass the silence to dispel
Switch on the telly, hear the morning lies
Shaving a face I hardly recognise

And something tells me trouble lies ahead
And still beside you I would lay my head
-----------
The bobby's helmet has a visor now
There's plasma screens inside the Old Dun Cow
Three pounds won't buy you a pint of beer
If you don't like it there's a Tesco near

There's angry driving on the motorway
And little screens to show us all the way
But we have lost the way some time ago
And what we're driven to we just don't know.

And something tells me trouble lies ahead
And still beside you I would lay my head
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We make believe our world has all in place
We text each other LOL and smiley face
It's not a face but just a mask we wear
For we have things inside we dare not share

We get knocked down and we get up again
We think we see the sun shine through the rain
From day to day we stumble in a dream
And talk a lot to hide the silent scream.

And something tells me trouble lies ahead
And still beside you I would lay my head