A glittering haven of sunshine and splashes
away from the clamour of stock market crashes
that shatter the lives of the poor,
with factories closing and managers laying
off workers with mortgages they are repaying,
while capital gains stay secure.
Sweet peach flavoured cocktails with cherries are shaken,
and wooden framed poolside recliners are taken
by swim suited models who lie
with lithe languid figures like swans that are resting,
while crowds crazed by hunger are loudly protesting,
with faces imploring the sky.
Their yachts sail away to where summer is waiting.
Enriched by the interest their wealth is creating,
they balance their stock market shares,
while men on the street feel the shock of recession
that spirals down chasms of howling depression,
and all they have left are their prayers.
While golden tanned limbs absorb sun dappled weather,
subversive infractions have broken the tether.
The vessel is slipping away
to shores where the tanks clad in armour are grinding,
with echoes of famine and warfare rewinding,
and fallout has darkened in the day.
© Lisa-Jane La Grange
“Sunshine and Splashes” is a rhyming poem about the inequality that exists in the world. It is intended to display the contrast between luxury and suffering.
The poem shows a world divided between sheltered wealth and economic despair.
It places glittering poolside leisure beside stock market crashes, factory closures, hunger, recession, famine, and war. This disparity exposes the detachment of those protected by capital, who continue enjoying cocktails, yachts, and sunshine while ordinary people lose jobs, homes, and hope.
The repeated movement of “Sunshine and Splashes” from beauty to ruin gives is intended to add bitter potency to the theme. The sunshine becomes almost ironic. It warms the privileged while others face darkness. The poem suggests that financial comfort can become a kind of escape, but not a true refuge. Beneath the surface glamour, social collapse, protest, and violence gather like storm clouds over paradise.
