"As I sit here, grinning among the mad, I long to escape. I had a home once, long ago. So long, in fact, I can't quite remember if it was real or if I made it up. Perhaps it wasn't a home, only a fantasy I created as a child to make life more tolerable. That is where children have the advantage - suspension of disbelief. As you grow older, the veil lifts from your eyes and you begin to see the world as it really is. You begin to hurt, and there is no one left who can kiss it better.

I now reside in a world of crumbling castles and black clouds. Sounds like the sinister part of a fairytale, but this is more real than I would like it to be. A place where the grass is so green and sweet smelling they write songs about it, but where the citizens are evolutionary cast-offs. My prince, the knight most likely to rescue me, is how I came to be here in the first place. He whisked me off my feet and brought me to the crumbling kingdom.

And I can never leave.

Even Persephone was allowed to leave the underworld and venture to the land of the living for half the year - here I can't even tell if the seasons have changed. Like slaves trying to buy our own freedom, we only seem to get whipped for our efforts. The evil ones who dwell in this land get fat and drunk off the sweat of our brow, and keep us in bondage to ensure they never have to do a day's honest work.

I am told that it wasn't always like this. This is a land rich in heritage and brave tales. A land of honor, or so I hear. The men were strong and proud, taking nothing from anyone, living by the land and the strength of their own backs. These men worked hard, and fought for their land so rich.

But now the tide has turned, and the men and women of this land have grown lazy. Their ancestors worked so hard to provide for them, that they never learned how to provide for themselves. They no longer work the land, or anything else for that matter. They sit in their homes, paid for by the labor of us slaves, eating and drinking and carrying on. The only battles they fight now are between themselves, and they are not battles of honor. They fight now for sport, out of boredom, and because the intoxicants have addled their minds. We are not safe on the streets here, because the madness spills out after dark. They will draw your blood without even knowing your name. Out of meanness, or spite, or some perceived threat. It feels as if I have travelled back to a time without laws or boundaries, a time before man was given a moral conscience - many centuries ago.

And I am trapped here. There is no end to this misery, because once you are here, they keep you too low for escape. No matter how hard you try, you will never raise yourself high enough to get out and see the sun again. Many strong people have given up, and given in. They have chosen to become as low as our conquerors, because it is often the only way to provide the means to feed their families. The vile among us have stolen and squandered the riches of this once-great land, and left the rest of us to try and fill the gap. Although we work hard, our efforts result in more and more being confiscated by the low. The moral among us will not be able to raise the means to get away, or to overthrow.

All I want is to be free of this land, and feel the sun shining once again on my shoulders. I want my prince to be with me, so that I may show him the beauty that life in other lands may offer. I want to return to the place from which I came, for although it was never much of a home to me, it afforded the opportunity to create one out of nothing - instead of the sorrow that is created here."

- A few words from a working woman living in the UK welfare state - me.