To play song click link…
https://henrysparks.bandcamp.com/track/where-is-our-city-where-is-our-king
Where is our city? Where is our king?
Where hangs the star on the best motel
The towers of gold and money they all had their day
We move without hope or faith in anything
In the dawn it was clear that no one enters in
And none of our dreams worked out
We do not believe anymore
And they were the last
To believe in their dreams
Where is our city and where is our king
And who would have thought we would ever say that thing
And who stole our water and who killed the air
And who would have thought that no one really cares
And none of our dreams worked out
We do not believe anymore
And they were the last
To believe in their dreams
But nothing worked out
We do not believe anymore
I do not believe anymore
I do not believe anymore
This is not a happy song. But I believe that we are not in a happy place personally, nationally and globally. The economic system, and the British establishment have repeatedly shown themselves lacking and willfully short sighted. We are entering a crucial period for the future of the human race and the ecosphere of the planet with few global indicators that our leaders are capable of stepping up. The situation is only as it is because those people who are making big money have too much control over the levers of power which is as it always has been in the modern capitalist system. Therefore the status quo is the guiding light. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. The controllers of our destiny do not care that their fellow citizens have to use food banks. They are more concerned with the holy grail of endless growth which will raise up the poor up by crumbs that have fallen from their table; trickle down theory…and the discredited neoliberal agenda.
The song idea comes from a BBC film by Adam Curtis where a young Russian woman is interviewed and says that she and the people she knows have no hope for the future. I thought: What a dreadful sentence to have to serve in the 21st century… but then is that so different to what is happening here and now in the UK?
The only bright spot in our current situation is that it leaves us a lot of potential to improve! As I listen to the radio tell me of the evisceration of the conservatives at the local elections I wonder will the other candidates be any better? Probably not; but at least they might be a touch less complacent.
Nothing worked out; but I still grasp for hope.
As Greta Thunberg says on page 421 of The Climate Book:-
‘ To me, hope is not something that is given to you, it is something you have to earn, to create. It cannot be gained passively, through standing by and waiting for someone else to do something. Hope is taking action. It is stepping outside your comfort zone. And if a bunch of weird schoolkids were able to get millions of people to start changing their lives, just imagine what we could all do together if we really tried.’
The song is recorded at the kitchen table on a little digital bug. Unfortunately it was recorded as an MP3 but there is.