by Ian Thorpe
As we hear more and more of prophecies that foretell the end of the world I sense a growth of fear and tension in people's behaviour. So I want to tell everybody not to worry. The world may be in trouble but - the Bureaucrats have a scheme to save our civilisation. Whatever disaster threatens, the pen pushers have it covered. Remember how when the world faced the threat of nuclear war, they sent out a leaflet advising us to stick brown paper on our windows and sit under the table. Reassuring, isn't it. Now their scheme involves ensuring that if we are hit by a rogue asteroid, attacked by aliens or merely suffocate under mountains of official forms, enough bureaucrats will survive to make sure that the rebuilding of civilisation is properly administered. There may be some queries about the way I spell Armegeddon. The traditional Armageddon refers, I'm told, to a predicted "Battle of Meged." During the Great War of 1914 - 18 there was a battle of Meged, a small town in what was then Palestine. So we missed it. Pity really; the T - shirts would have sold millions......


When doomsday comes and the world is destroyed
By war, famine, plague or a rogue asteroid,
Or a cloud of pollution blocks the warmth of the sun,
Of the people who survive - I pray I'm not one,
For many prophecies predict the destruction of man,
And all we have to prevent it is the bureaucrats' plan.
There are underground cities where the chosen few
Will hide from disaster while me and you
Take our chance on the surface, and if we come through,
The Public Officials will slowly emerge
From hidey - holes deep in the bowels of the earth
They will take things in hand and their task will be first
To ensure that each person still left alive
Has applied for permit to be allowed to survive.
( In triplicate please or you're deemed to have died)
And if you still exist, fill in one questionnaire
To claim your allowance of food and fresh air,
And another for water and medical care.
There are forms to fill in and filing to do,
So they send you away to wait in a queue
'Till you die of starvation, thirst or the flu
Because no-one at all in the entire nation
Will produce any food, drink or medication.
Everyone works in administration
And as the curtain comes down on our civilisation
With nobody left to record history
The key to our fate will be a mystery
Because every trace of our culture and wisdom
Will forever be misplaced in the filing system





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