Welfare diversion

The hand that was drawn up

Forging a way for equality

Lifting up the downtrodden

To gaze on a new horizon

One full of possibilities

Only equality can deliver as progress

Slowly now this hand withdraws from need

Lending itself to a wealth of misdirection

Pushing down the desire to rise

Against a machine that counts

Human suffering as profitable

Herding contemporary slaves to order

This violence goes by deprived of need,

insisting in its legitimacy

While denying legitimate needs existence

Scorning welfare with such triumph

The hand of need falls down in shame

So the welfare cuts become entrenched

An easy diversion to subsidies

Into an ever narrowing wealth pocket

That will hold the helping hand captive

Crumbling democracy in its tight grip

Fading is the social design to support

The protection of a safety net 

And the demise will not spare 

The separation of the enterprise

-Camille Delaquise

This poem appears in Behind the Facade, Camille’s debut contemporary poetry collection. Welfare diversion speaks to the political betrayal of social care — exposing how systems built to uphold equality are hollowed out when public need is sacrificed to protect private wealth and entrenched power.

This poem is available as a contemporary poetry print on textured recycled card.