The word mines

Paradise

2012-02-16T05:34:00.007-08:00

The smell of rancid fat

On a sultry afternoon

The chips are sizzling and the sky’s

A violent shade of blue

The wife is flipping burgers

I think I’ll have some fun

I’ll go down to the beach

And grow my belly in the sun

Another beer, another game

Another drunken clash

Another plate of pie and mash

At Harry’s English caff

She welcomed me to heaven

On her beauties I could dwell

She does the wash and cooks for me

An’ other stuff as well …

While I watch the telly

She tidies round the house

You could have a wife like her

All you need’s a mouse

Another beer, another game

Another drunken clash

Another plate of pie and mash

At Harry’s English caff

She’s as pretty as a postcard

My doll, my peach, my bride

She doesn’t mind when I get drunk

She loves it, ’er inside

Pour me another lager love

To end the pissed-up night

I met this bird in paradise

She loves the English life

Another beer, another game

Another drunken clash

Another plate of pie and mash

At Harry’s English caff

Humming bird

2012-02-15T08:06:00.001-08:00

Apart from us – taut, exotic and svelte
Your existence is parallel to ours
With your dreadlocks, nose ring and bullet belt
You are fast. Your minutes are our hours
I infer the beating of your caged heart
On your thin bike, the wheels are a sliver
You do not see me. Your narrow eyes dart
If I am clay, you are like quicksilver
Some hunt singly, some gather, some herd
Some esteem eating, or books, or song
You are an exotic – a humming bird
In a moment you will flit away, be gone
In humans, we value beauty and good
You are different. I'd follow if I could

2012-02-13T12:41:00.004-08:00

RockZest at The Rose - Debut Gig from Graham Russell on Vimeo.

This is me on the left playing the bass, not very well, and my lovely friends, Cecillia (the goddess of music), Alfredo on drums and Dan Morley on guitar. We are an anglo-Italian band from south-east London, SE 23. We are going to do some of our own songs soon. Watch this space. Will

A prayer for Conservative councillors

2012-02-13T06:00:00.000-08:00

A COURT ruling banning prayers from being a part of formal council meetings has been slammed by councillors who claim that God helps them make important decisions.

Redbridge News

To the tune of Bank Robber (approximately) by the Clash

Make taxes lower for our pals
By depriving hospitals
Favour the wealthy, force the poor
To work much longer than before
To bigger bonuses says ‘yes’
While you destroy the NHS
Punish and ignore the sick
Privatise and cherry pick
The assets of the welfare state
While racking up the bankers' slate

May the days be long and dark
Especially in the closed-down park
May all the libraries be shut
Up with knowledge do not put
Close down every meals-on-wheels
Let the hungry live on eels
Keep the masses in their place

With booze and bingo and replace

Their services with charity

Call it the ‘Big Society’

Please God can you fill my gut

With frequent trips to Pizza Hut

Curse the left and bless the right

Let more beggars freeze at night

Fill the world with spleen and hate

Oppose an EU ‘super state’

Freedom and human rights, you see

Are an alien currency

Thanks for all this, oh and mate

Leave me a key by heaven's gate

Note: May the ‘Big Society’ be nailed for all time as what it is – a way of rolling back everything meritocratic and progressive that was achieved in the twentieth-century, especially after World War Two.

Violence and hope: a controversy on the 63

2012-02-10T10:52:00.000-08:00

NB Martin Amis author, Christopher Hitchens, journalist

Two people sit on the bus, discussing Shakespeare
Another: “Your Uncle Vanya was superb”
Our driver, a classics scholar with film star looks
Speaks in Greek to his friend. He's never forgiven him
For those comments, in the London Review of Books

The sky's a gigantic, suppurating bruise
There's Peckham Rye common, where Blake saw his angels
Puddles, with tower blocks in them, slide by us
Queen's Road, where the palm trees of Peckham parade

Listlessly. But who is this getting on the bus?

It's only Hitchens and Amis – Starsky and Hutch!

Hitch's last book is on everybody's mind

The atheist tract set Lewisham alight –
God is Not Great: The Case Against Religion

Everyone has an opinion all right!

A stranger joins them. Looks like a varsity man

His Oxford scarf is an exclamation mark

He and Hitch are friends, they met at Balliol

Precocious union debates were their platforms –

Rowing on the Cherwell at dawn, the May ball

We have entered that liminal zone, the Old Kent Road

The least favoured spot on the Monopoly board

Every pub claims to be Henry Cooper's gym

You can still smell the Brylcreem and aftershave

“Splash it on all over”, they used to call him

Here, thin yellow men regret the smoking ban

Punch drunk, their fingers twitch for untipped Rothmans

Collecting beer glasses in their frosted-glass lairs

They are Charlie Chaplins, without his millions

Violence and hope flavour the atmosphere

We slither past Tesco's; to its rear the Shard

A slim, grey needle, pierces the sombre sky
“A point well made,” says Hitchens, of his new mate
“Martin?” The upper-deck debate's in full swing

What would Amis pere have thought? Martin hesitates

“I'm sorry I don't agree,” he announces

He will overcome this upstart; fuck him up

Like an unleashed Staff, he goes on the attack

“I see that you haven't read Christopher's book;

If you had done so, you would understand that ...”

As we pass through the Elephant, the boys

Go at it, hammer and tongs, giving it some

At Blackfriars, the brown river staggers by

Does God exist? At least they have entertained

The 63 bus is themed by their colloquy

Playing tennis with Martin Amis

2012-02-10T10:48:00.001-08:00

Martin's vicious forehand slams
A yellow missile onto the baseline
It's a rocket. Whistles like a bullet
Two games to one. Final set

With a faintly superior smile
He looks almost apologetic
‘I'm afraid I won that one, again’
He shows barely a trace of sweat

My people wrapped butter for his
There is a certain look to their mouths
We pressed their cricket whites
Ran their baths, polished their brogues

Their superiority is in-bred
Part of the order of things
Like Martin's forehand lob
We died for them in our droves

Prep school, Oxford, the coxless fours
And now this. A minor victory
On the municipal courts
He is about to take me apart

He crouches at the quivering net
He'll be modest in victory, of course
Smile and offer a limp fist
Shame I had such a rotten start

Juvenescence

2012-02-10T04:45:00.000-08:00

For Dan

We can be sure it's no longer night
Pitched halfway between black and white

The world will be indeterminate today
Seen through a gauze, in shades of grey

On the stretched common, like a frozen sea
Ice-rimed willows bend intimately

The stumps of men on the white field
Show us that the snow will yield

Casually, we talk of ‘nightmare’ and ‘chaos’
As if the winter could kill us

We are fascinated by our ice skin
But we know that it will never win

We will go to the library on the bus
Go to sleep; the light will wake us

Go to work, come home and then
There will be summer, winter and summer again

The Northern Line

2012-02-09T04:18:00.000-08:00

I study your resting face on the train
A powdered carapace. You are on standby
Soon, you will leave and be human again
Exercise judgment, laugh and cry.
We merge our black clothes into the crowd
Our faces frozen, because to smile
Is to be human; it's not allowed
For each stretched minute, attenuated mile.
We work and rest, breathe easily or cough
Our lives are finite, for good or ill
Measured steps define our humanity.
We are human. The light goes on and off
There is no goodness in the surrendered will
Without ego, there is no morality.

Note: I was with my friend Corin in the pub last night. Over a few pints, as well as other matters, we were discussing why the Nazis had an affinity with Buddhism (counter-intuitive subject, but it’s true) and why sentimentality and violence go together. The Nazis were very sentimental about animals – Himmler could not abide the idea of cruelty to the creatures of the forest – the deer and wild boar. I ventured that it is because under both fascism and Buddhism the will is surrendered, allowing evil to prosper. And I said “without ego there is no morality”. I know it’s controversial but I think that Buddhism lends itself to state immorality – look at Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge. This leads us to the problem of evil and to its Christian solution, which I don’t necessarily agree with, that God gave us freedom of choice so as to allow us to choose to be good. This implies that good only exists with reference to bad, just as light only exists in relation to darkness.

I thought, this morning, of the heavily made-up, London woman in her impractical clothes I had seen on the tube the previous day, travelling from Waterloo to Charring Cross, on the good old Northern Line. A minute on the Northern Line is equivalent to an hour above ground. Her face was a mask. On the tube, all of our faces are masks. Why? We surrender our humanity. But what if the train crashed? Some people would be frozen with terror. Some would help others; some just look after themselves. Humanity would break in – and morality. What if we lived forever and we were happy all the time? There would be no morality, but there would ne no need for morality because we would not need to make choices about apportioning wealth or sharing things out. The poem stems from the expression on the woman’s face.

St Harry of Redknapp

2012-02-07T04:28:00.000-08:00

Harry Redknapp cleared of tax evasion

Harry Redknapp said his "nightmare" was over after being cleared of tax evasion.The Tottenham boss had denied accepting secret untaxed bonus payments from former Portsmouth chairman Milan Mandaric, while he was club manager.Mr Mandaric was also cleared of two charges of cheating the public revenue over the £189,000 payments.

For Steve M

You reject wealth to honour other's needs
In tax you pay far more than is your due
In city slums, observing beggars' weeds
No-one is more generous than you
A saintly man, a humble mendicant
You take no stock in houses, cars or food
And live quite simply, for your wants are scant
Your only pleasure – merely doing good
To serve the poor is your ascetic creed
A respected philanthropist, you bestow
Your well-earned riches like scattering seed
Whether in Tottenham or Monaco
If not on earth, you will be praised by Him
Welcomed to glory by the seraphim

The right notes

2012-01-31T07:49:00.000-08:00

For Jazzy John

In the shadows before caffeine and light
Strange creatures assemble in black coats
On the wrong side of the city, at night
Bending the darkness with their sweet notes
They astonish with their lines and chords
Knowing when to blend, when to thrill
They lend us poetry without words
With each arpeggio and rapid fill
Accurate notes, some softer, some faster
Are a form of artistry best observed
In the skilful hands of a master
In deep cellars where candles are burned
The void is filled by luminous sound
In the dark, the brightest light is found

A meditation upon ageing

2012-01-26T08:19:00.000-08:00

Found in the attic, a cracked old stein
With love to dad a present from the Rhine
It was the last trip you were allowed on
During your youthful rebellion
It is the prerogative of youth to rage
I did. I was a hippy at that age
How I laughed at my parents' tacky crap
There were musicals before there was rap
Radio 2, Semprini's Serenade
David Jacobs and his ‘hit parade’
Now my stuff has the same effect on you
The Groundhogs, Focus, Led Zeppelin II

Rebellions are based on hair and beats
And trouser widths but history repeats
In Camden, thin young men in photo shoots
Are wearing skinny jeans and desert boots
From each generation comes barbarous rhyme
From skiffle to rock to hip-hop then to grime
We offend our children, they will theirs
By being boring, or nerds, or ‘squares’
We urge upon the young our own decorum
‘Do not go out like that,’ we implore them
We leave our past, but then it comes back
Nostalgia is in, grey is the new black

Perhaps fashion is merely a sense of smell
For what is lasting, what ephemeral
My old greatcoat lingers in the hall
A musty relic from a market stall
Redolent and frayed like old rope
Of patchouli oil, Old Holborn and dope
I wore it at Reading, damp and high
On lager. Lasers flashed across the sky
I would not wear it now, it would look weird
Like a pony tail, or a goatee beard
Offences against taste make us sick
Knowing when to stop, that's the trick

Vis-a-vis the rain

2012-01-24T03:59:00.000-08:00

Vis-a-vis the rain it is still falling
Today relentlessly and apropos
The wintery weather conditions
We are experiencing a little snow
A crane buckets soft earth. Dots of red light
Like dragons' eyes pierce the misted window

Kids get on, seemingly hundreds of them
In purple, green, orange, lime and yellow
Like the lost ninth legion, knitted in wool
Sit down Usher! Take your hood down
They are unconcerned by the uplands slush
Their childish voices fill the bus. Living in now

Prozac Britain

2012-01-18T03:19:00.000-08:00

The iced winter air, so invigorating
Porridge and cold meat, finely sliced
Their textures set my pulses racing
British food – so delicately spiced
We watch a flower open, a slowed-down bug
In a state of opiated innocence
Now we are safe, pleasure is our drug
And sensuous, value-free experience
The cloying touch of freezing mud
Cold slate, sharp thistles, grey cloud
We say ‘it's good; it's all good’
We own nothing; frowning is not allowed
Once stoics, we endured them, they were bad
Now they are gone, we love them and are glad

I was in Pret A Manger in Stamford Street, London SE1, close to where I work. Everyone was smiling. How are you? I'm good thanks. I'm really good. I realised, at that moment, that the British have changed. Once, we were miserable, curmudgeonly and highly critical of anything ‘foreign’. Now, we have swung to the opposite extreme. We enjoy everything; we are open-minded and positive; nothing is bad. Of course, this is a far better collective state of mind to be in than our previous one and I have always advocated putting Prozac in the water supply. My little sonnet is merely an observation of how Britain has changed in my lifetime – for geopolitical as much as for psychosocial reasons.

Alas poor Wozzer

2012-01-11T07:18:00.000-08:00

CELEB chef Antony Worrall Thompson has made a grovelling apology after The Sun revealed today that he was arrested for shoplifting cheese and wine at a Tesco store.

There has been massive trauma in my life and I was abused as a child but I can't blame my childhood for this. I hope I'm not going totally gaga in my old age. I have wondered whether it's something like that but I hope 60 is too young for something like Alzheimer's and I do feel that I have to take responsibility for this.

A cruel fate, you were abused by mummy

And turned to comfort eating, hence your tummy

Diminutive of frame and short of arse

You donned the chef’s whites for your daily brass

To spite your wealthy gran you plied the trade

Of chop and filet, sauce and marinade

And selling sickly food gave you success

A string of restaurants, a posh address

You flattered Princess Di, your royal host

A portly jester bearing Melba toast

Some chefs are known to bully or harangue

You were emollient, a sweet meringue

You won the housewife’s heart with nanny’s food

Fawned to the rich but to the poor were rude

Beneath your sugared crust, sickly as cola

A pin-striped chancer in the latest Roller

No sylph and hardly blessed with film star looks

You joined the pantheon of TV cooks

A jealous, quarrelling gaggle, how they sneered

At your “squashed Bee Gee” face, your ginger beard

Recession hit, they laughed as you went down

And traded in a poorer part of town

You made them snigger with your poison leaf

And now, collared in Tesco, you’re a thief!

Apparently for figures of your station

Nicking stuff is just an aberration

It was not me, it must have been dementia

I am only guilty in absentia

The cruel abuse I suffered renders me

Immune from law, I’m seeking therapy

All utter tosh, you stole to fill your frame

Greed is greed. Now you should take the blame

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4046788/Chef-Antony-Worrall-Thompson-shoplifts-at-Tesco.html

Death of an atheist

2011-12-18T03:48:00.000-08:00

With a puzzled frown, he faced the gloom
No more books, or riffs, too weak to attack
His bags were packed. He left the room
He walked into the night and did not come back
It was the dark time, before Christmas
He was stoical. Bravery was his thing
The Higgs boson still eluded us
He was Prometheus – man is king
God is not great, he said, we are
In this, he was wrong – and right
It was a lonely place to park his car
For God is our breath. God is light
The song of birds. Every particle
Each word we write. Every article

Sir Rick of Parfitt

2011-11-30T05:55:00.000-08:00

Wealth was the measure of our success
Better amps, bigger shows, louder, faster
The villas and pools I've had; the palace
Where I played my Telecaster
We were celebrated and loud, yes
But we were modest avatars
Being ordinary served us best
Lads in denim – big German cars
Life was better when we played in bars
There is no art in the gluttonous
The powdery crunch of our guitars
Was so simple, powerful, numinous
I do not seek too much, as before
To sustain my craft and art, less is more

Life on the road is pretty healthy these days. ‘We always take a chef with us – I don't eat any pasta. I don't eat any potatoes. I rarely eat any bread. I give myself a break once a week and have something with more carbs in it, but for the most part I just stick to protein.’

Rick Parfitt of Status Quo quoted in Guitar and Bass magazine, December 2011

Bulbophyllum Nocturnum

2011-11-23T00:02:00.000-08:00

For Fergus

A night-flowering orchid, the first of its kind known to science, has been described by a team of botanists.

Experts say the "remarkable" species is the only orchid known to consistently flower at night, but why it has adopted this behaviour remains a mystery

How they oppress, the prisons of the hills
They are so easy to overrate
We have opened up the satanic mills
In all honesty, I have learnt to hate
William Wordsworth's nodding daffodils
I find no romance in tranquility
There is no poetry in my poetry

You'll see no metaphor or simile
In my work. They have served us ill
For they are delusions merely
Pathetic fallacies. My skill
Is in describing the ordinary
There is much to be said for banality
There is no poetry in my poetry

In our corrupted universe
They are deluded who turn to the light
Merely in their tedious verse
Let us praise flowers that bloom at night
Not sunsets, angels or Celtic slush
And explore strangeness not beauty
There is no poetry in my poetry

A vision of ignorance

2011-11-16T09:34:00.000-08:00

The Euro swooned. It felt unwell

Greece was sick and going to hell

Bad times for traders in red socks

Flapping arms and falling stocks

From the bankers came solutions

Less help for higher contributions

To keep them rich and screw the poor

While all the blame went to their door

They rioted, the markets spoke

We'll take that Papandreou bloke

The problem wasn't over yet

Because of high Italian debt

Another victim had to do

Exit ‘bunga’‘bunga’ Silvio

The markets growled, the euro sighed

The markets roared, the euro cried

Speaking in the bankers' hall

Eton Dave welcomes the fall

Complacent and myopian

Despising the ‘utopian’

It's part of the Conservative scheme

To wreck the European dream

Viewing from the UK prison

Its social egalitarianism

Dave speaks the Anglo Saxon creed

The ancient law of class and greed

Bullying markets rule the day

Dictating government policy

Equality and rights are sins

Only fit for Jacobins

Lower taxes make us free

And for the poor austerity

Lament for a death in Forest Hill

2011-11-09T02:33:00.000-08:00

U will neva be forgoten becos
All that u did was good
We grew up in the same hood
U was a brotha to me, my cuz

I know I wasn't always there
But u were always in my heart
Even when we were far apart
I hope that you know that, yeh

U r in a beta place now
Than this one, I swear
1 day I hope to c u there
Cos u are my brethren, my blood

Gangland killers at funeral 'may have gunned down wrong man'

A man killed in a gangland shooting at a funeral may have been shot by mistake, police believe.
Azezur Khan, 21, was blasted at close range by a pair of gunmen in front of hundreds of mourners.
Two 17-year-old girls and two men of 20 have been arrested and released on bail over the killing outside a cemetery in East Dulwich, South-East London.

Old records

2011-11-07T07:44:00.000-08:00

Neatly from the alphabet they stare

Equal in rank, crooner and head
With their stacked heels and bouffant hair
Des O'Connor and the Grateful Dead
Their sleeeves fading to obscurity
The too-sincere, dangerous and mad
With cracked old videos for 50p
I watched them with mum and dad
Stoned and square, hippy and straight
They are moving to oblivion
Time does not discriminate
Shuffling to the bargain bin
Perhaps it is better to end up here
Than in a summer season on some pier

Gypsy king

2011-10-14T04:06:00.000-07:00

His face is white, he's too fat now
He sees the spaces in the crowd

He's the gypsy king of Forest Hill

Once when he was dark and thin

When he played his violin

Girls gathered round at every show

The Devil sat behind his bow

In his dead face, his eyes are bright

They see the corners of the night

He's the gypsy king of Forest Hill

The good times he remembers still

He filled the room with every trill

Now he sleeps through every day

And hopes his magic touch will stay

There was lustre in his gold

Before the nights grew sad and cold

He's the gypsy king of Forest Hill

You would say his songs are hot

Even if his band are not

Though he's old he still has skill

He’d murder you if looks could kill

His face is white, he’s too fat now

He sees the spaces in the crowd

He's the gypsy king of Forest Hill

One night, in the year 1713 I dreamed I had made a pact with the devil for my soul. Everything went as I wished: my new servant anticipated my every desire. Among other things, I gave him my violin to see if he could play. How great was my astonishment on hearing a sonata so wonderful and so beautiful, played with such great art and intelligence, as I had never even conceived in my boldest flights of fantasy. I felt enraptured, transported, enchanted: my breath failed me, and - I awoke. I immediately grasped my violin in order to retain, in part at least, the impression of my dream. In vain! The music which I at this time composed is indeed the best that I ever wrote, and I still call it the "Devil's Trill", but the difference between it and that which so moved me is so great that I would have destroyed my instrument and have said farewell to music forever if it had been possible for me to live without the enjoyment it affords me.

Giuseppe Tartini quoted in Lalande's Voyage d'un François en Italie (1765 - 66)

The fiddler

The old roué eyes the thinning crowd

The pub is empty, the band too loud

He is portly now, pale his skin

He views the vacant seats, recalling when

He wowed the festivals with his bow

His thin moustache curled, and how

With his bolero jacket, pencil thin

He could astonish with his violin

Then there was lustre in his gypsy gold

Before the gigs dried up, the nights grew cold

The girls would whoop with surprise

He played them with his fiddle and his eyes

On this weekday night, in this sad place

His dark eyes flash in his pale face

They say that even here, he is hot

A gypsy balladeer. The band are not

They do it for pin money and beer

The men who played in … insert name here

Miliband minor

2011-09-30T07:04:00.000-07:00

With the kind of wave that says, ‘hi’

Young Edward turns down the flame to blue

You know, he says, I’m your kind of guy

That’s what I think and so do you

The too well-pressed suit and strange hair

The wide staring eyes and awkward pose

Form a question – Redwood or Blair?

In the faint blue glow from a silver rose

The faithful punctuate his artful speech

Applaud politely each careful glissando

A curious camera plays on each

As they rise to his awkward crescendo

A nerd in a debate one would have said

No blood in his veins. At this rate, Ed is dead

The Unwelcoming Arms (Unfriendly Street)

2011-09-29T03:29:00.000-07:00

Maybe I should give it one more chance
The stupidly-named beers, badly kept
And the meagre, over-priced snacks
Provide an authentic ambience

The crimson drinkers whose stare is blank
Sun-ripened by some Spanish pool
Radiate their indifference
Like lobsters plucked from a tank

I used to pretend it was not rough
The bitter not sour, the lager sweet
Until one of them turned on me
It seems I was not local enough

These men do not kiss or smile
And balk at words other than fuck
Guarding their space like toreadors
I stopped going out, for a while

A wolf's tale

2011-09-28T07:12:00.000-07:00

In my dream was a long corridor
Wood panelled, an important meeting
A crimson coat hung outside the door
Could it be yours? My heart was beating
A hunter's role is assigned to me
I waited outside, as I always had
It is unfair, my villanous history
For I am mad, I am not merely bad
This time, you did not turn or take flight
We talked, calmly. We had left the wood
I miss it so much, stalking you, at night
Your eyes widening – Little Red Riding Hood
Our lives are not long. I miss them, creeping through
Your heart moving beneath mine, hunting you

The gaudy pageant of the past

2011-09-16T08:51:00.000-07:00

I remember the 1970s

The three-day week, Joe Gormley

The first miners’ strike

Eddie Waring’s ‘oop an’ under’

There was wrestling on TV

Oh yeh, I was there …

Then there were the 1980s –

Dallas and Dynasty

Cocktails and shoulder pads

Terry Wogan’s studied unease

The Style Council were good

Duran Duran were…. please

The ’90s were a bit vague

In some ways, they were a blur

Buttered parsnips … oh yes

New Labour, Brit Pop

It was all so embarrassing

Do I remember them? Er …

The Noughties had no sooner started

Than they were gone. Millenniuuuum

No style, no music, no drugs

(Apart from the usual ones)

There were iPods and MP3s

If you count them. But I’d rather not

The past crowds into our troubled teens

Thatcher is still around – that cow

The present is where we live

With a bunch of memories

Stacked up, like old CDs

To be honest, the best time is now

News from now here

2011-09-02T08:27:00.000-07:00

At London’s gate it rose, in SE1
Democratic and utilitarian

Here, the post-war settlement began
The hub of Abercrombie’s London plan

The giant blocks and decks of the Heygate
Expressed the power and hope of the state

In the sky-leaning architecture we see
Faith in the future and modernity

Over the estate, sheathed in black and grey
The vast Stratos tower looms today

The pages of slick brochures show us how
These flats cost millions; bankers live here now

Reward for self-interest – the new way
Society crumbles – a slow-motion decay

The rich get richer, the poor riot a bit
The state did not fail; we failed it

In a legend to make Abercrombie cry
Now here say giant letters in the sky

Each era, a new skin is painted on
The future lost; conservatism won

Pics taken by me from my beloved 63 bus as we arrived at the Elephant and Castle area of south London, which I have been travelling to, and through, for various reasons for the past 25 years. Nowhere of course means utopia.

The departed

2011-08-23T13:28:00.000-07:00

To my mother

They watch us, coolly, from their beds of slate.
They regard us, with their sepia eyes –
The obscure and those who are merely great.
Their pale image offers no surprise.
They have left us, into eternal night,

Slipped into the darkness, like rusty ships.

They do not smile. They are in black and white.

Our warm faces will never touch their lips.

All has been evened out, even their sin.
They have dissolved, into the great shade.
Only the newly-gone can prick our skin
Although a colour photograph can fade.
She drew me to her breast on happy days.
Now she has gone away, her picture stays.

Note: the photograph was taken in a studio in Cairo – my mum was in the the women's army, the ATS – in 1942 or ’43. She would have been about 17, having run away from home in Coventry at 15 and lied about her age to join the service.

The eternal present

2011-08-21T13:05:00.000-07:00

Beneath the oak trees, now dark, now bright
Their shapes shifting continually
A startling galaxy, the points of light
Are ruffled soul mates of eternity.
As the gentle river mirrors the sky
Water is moved by particles of air
Its form is in flux, how can I
Describe what is no longer there
In a perpetual dance of matter?
As it shears through time smoothly, my prow
Splits future and past, air and water
Shows where I have been, where yet to go
The lapping water is a benediction
A hopeful promise, a valediction

Note: never look back in a canoe, or you risk falling in

The Riots

2011-08-10T08:02:00.001-07:00

Home Secretary Theresa May today rejected a warning from senior police officers that the Government's spending cuts will leave forces unable to cope with rising social and industrial tensions

The Independent, 15 September, 2010

My dogs are better behaved and subscribe to a higher code of values than the young rioters of Tottenham, Hackney, Clapham and Birmingham

Max Hastings, Daily Mail, August 2011

They made the Royal Family frown

In Manchester and Canning Town

In shopping malls and retail huts

Reacting to the budget cuts

Kids reached through shattered glass and ran

In Tottenham and Lewisham

Like crazed bankers at bonus time

But City greed is not a crime

It’s natural justice, common sense

That the poor show deference

Why should money be their glitch?

It only motivates the rich!

Tabloid and broadsheet lust for blood

Against the wearers of the hood

Liberal policemen, they avow

Have slaughtered England’s sacred cow

It is a holy trinity

Business, greed and property

Buttressed by hypocrisy

A pretend aristocracy

They see the world through thatch and fields

As riot police with Perspex shields –

A Praetorian guard who shove and bray –

To keep the urban poor at bay

Hastings with his marbled nose

Rolls out a length of purple prose

My dogs have more respect, he writes

Than these unfathered urbanites

Making an unholy row

Even the girls are it now!

How dare they clamour to be free

For self-expression, liberty

Only war will make them manly

A healthy slaughter, like Port Stanley

The town hall flag has turned bright red

The age of deference is dead

Politicians cuss and rave

The camera follows Eton Dave

How have the latest cuts gone down

At the poorer end of town?

Tanned from a Tuscan holiday

He speaks of criminality

Through smouldering ruins now he sees

A broken Big Society

Spoiled by benefits and health

The weak have tried to share his wealth

Only the rich can shout and smash

Abuse the meek and splash their cash

A small portion of infinity

2011-08-09T06:09:00.000-07:00

The sky is a scribbled-on slate
A careful study in grey
Like a dull ache, day follows day.
At night the town glows softly –
A small portion of infinity.
The world is in my van.

The wind crosses the tidal flats

Teases samphire and rocket.
It pushes a stiff-winged tern
Over the coral shell bank.
Slowly, it erases memory.
This is where I began.

Note: Bradwell-on-Sea which gave rise to this is small village at mouth of the Blackwater Estuary in Essex. It has one of Britain's most ancient churches , built by Saxons from the ruins of a Roman fort; also an airfield used in World War two and a pub, The Cricketers, which used to have the signatures of doomed airmen inscribed on its ceiling. Oh and an nuclear power station. It's a haunting place, a couple of hours drive from London.

I show a prospective tenant around my house. It goes terribly wrong

2011-08-03T03:50:00.000-07:00

Walking through the estate, you were whistled at
Then he sucked his teeth at you, some bloke
Because you're blonde. I said, ‘you should wear a hat’
I live next to the estate. It's not bad. It was a joke

A joke! Women are abused daily. Don't you see!
I do see. I was born in ’58, before the schism
It put us on barricades, men like me
We conceded the ground – we were wrong – to feminism

The hat thing – it was just irony, but you
Saw the dust on the stairs, page three in the Sun
You re-built the barricade. You withdrew
Suddenly, I was Jeremy Clarkson

My humour was misplaced. It's fair enough
But now it's all lads' mags and fake tan
I just don't get it, the new stuff
Compared to that I'm a new man

Rapture

2011-07-27T03:15:00.000-07:00

A whiff of weed, a spidery tattoo
You veered all over, with your band
A startled goddess of incense and kohl
No, you were never safe, or bland
Most of us stay in the middle – not you

Some who with the devil sup
Retain no sense of ill, or wrong
We observed your imperiled innocence
Through each false step and slurred song
Fascinated and appalled we pulled you up

Immortal beauty does not age or cough
Fire is dangerous – you touched a lot
It burned you through. We did not see
That your nerves were gone, your lungs were shot
You teetered to the edge and fell off

Penge High Street

2011-07-19T06:22:00.000-07:00

Believed to be in talks with himself
Mad Tom shouts at the trees
And hurls abuse at the passing cars
He was washed up here years ago
No-one notices the bearded Defoe
And his crazed pavement philosophies

The bunting thrown across the road
The dappled leaves that softly dance
The neat almshouses' quiet calm
The traffic island, almost a square
Why, but for the food – crisps and nuts
One could almost be in France

Day after day simply passes by
In a routine of meat and bread
One road leads out, by the spire of St John's
The recreation ground and the Memorial
Here, the men of Penge are detained
Eternally. The dead are still dead

From the Crooked Billet I observe
The shadowed play of cloud and sun
In the guitar shop window. I absorb
The amber units of passing time
And the insane rantings of mad Tom.
Slowly, nothing is going on

Those who have been there – a select few – will know the magic of the place. Twangs is my favourite guitar shop and I am very partial to the Crooked Billet with its wonderful selection of crisps and nuts.

Out first ball

2011-07-13T03:49:00.000-07:00

Hair cut close, like a squaddie's bristle
They're well turned-out today, these guys
With their smart blazers and striped ties
They'll go over the top on the whistle
Torpor, snobbery – an English afternoon
The cloying smell of newly-mown grass
Hangs thick over the field, like trench gas
Fear clenched in the knotted gut. Go on son!
For the school. It's your chance to stand tall
Mortified. The rancid sweat and hollow laughter
Of the changing room, a prelude to slaughter
A black grenade drops from the sun. Out first ball
It's only your legs gone. You girl! Hide your pain
I hated cricket. I never played again

Note. Others like cricket. It never worked for me, probably because I was no good at it. At any rate, this poem is true. The one time I had a go at batting, I was out within seconds. Humiliating

Rebekah Brooks – a Greek tragedy

2011-07-08T10:38:00.000-07:00

Sharks feed on blood; fear is your food
Pale your skin, deadly your Siren's song
Fearsome spawn of a monstrous brood
Epitome of all that is wrong
Mistress of a chrome and glass lair
You are Cassandra, flame-haired one
Snakes writhe in your copper hair
You're a slave of the balance sheet
Your heart? There is ice there
You kissed Rupert's clay feet
For the pleasure of Moloch, his god
To keep the wrinkled old bastard sweet
You threw slimy Coulson to the plod
With false words and fake tears
You shafted your staff and kept your job
A faded ghost, you cannot hide your fear
You are not Medussa, you are Medea

NB: Terza Rima

Diary of unrepentant sinner

2011-07-04T13:08:00.001-07:00

I HATE THIS PRICK

Serialise book
Blair was not crook
David Kelly lied
It was suicide!
Need bling
Guest speaker
Free dinner
Kerching
Swear bully. Bully swear
Fake smile
Pretend to care

New Labour. Red rose
Big ego. Brown nose
Trash Gordon
Rubbish Peter
Publish excreta
On my blog
Wash hands of blood
Go for jog
Don't do shame
Walk dog
Don't do God

Single combat 3 July 2011

2011-07-03T23:31:00.001-07:00

It’s almost medieval, this thrust and thwack

It’s a denatured form of war

This trial of strength – defence, attack

No one dies. Instead, there’s a score

For honour, they disguise their pain

Their favours and colours on show

The bloodless knights of Serbia and Spain

Novak and Rafael – in stereo

The Serb’s the hero of the tournament

Behind his smile, is what all knight’s must know

That, soon, the prize money will be spent

The cup will fade, his lady’s look will go

Human memory is all too short

Wars are soon forgotten, so is sport

A gust of wind

2011-06-27T13:48:00.000-07:00

A gust of wind came in from the sky
And blew your face from the windowsill
The face that bore me through life, until
This moment. Must I now say goodbye?
One day, when I was looking elsewhere
A gust of wind. Your picture threw
You left me again, or did I leave you?
The pills help to take away my fear
They have deadened the pain of your going
My eyes are open – a new clarity
Comes from my unaccustomed sobriety
Tonight, I have left behind my grieving
For the soft, smiling face that still shows
Love from a broken frame. Must you go?

The streets of London

2011-06-15T04:59:00.000-07:00

For Patrick

Tollgate, workhouse and coaching inn
Open their doors to let you in
Beneath the cobbles and the mud
Are Mithras, Edgar and King Lud
The cabbies' horses, milk and hay
In London's fields not far away
Before modernity began
Legionnaire and highwayman
Streets are undressed – the world you see
A city clothed in history

Note: picture shows Ludgate Circus, where King Lud is buried

Mood swings

2011-06-13T04:18:00.000-07:00

Dispensing light and dark
Drunkenly, they sway and lurch
Like lunatics, across the park
Like the gates of a great church

Burgeoning with dark and light
They swing open to let us in
One moment it's day, then night
They announce salvation and sin

They weep, silently, on the grass
In an emotional drama
Is it tragedy or farce?
Above us – a panorama

The clouds switch and flash in the sky
Like Wagner or an English air
But in what kind of mood am I?

Complete joy or utter despair?

Footsteps and shadows – the story of a house

2011-06-04T01:59:00.000-07:00

It was built where the Great North Wood
Lapped against London – rus in urbe
Dairies, market gardens and clay pits
Farms and then houses, a suburb

The railway arrived – brick villas
Clustered thickly around the station
Goodbye to the telegraph and horse
Victoria dies – a coronation

They started our house and finished it
War came. Light fell across the wall
Millions were born. Another war
Footsteps and shadows. Voices in the hall

Radar, the bomb, nuclear technology
We breached sound but not light
Daily, the sun flickered across the wall
Marking the passage of day and night

All those years, no-one noticed
Stars or geology; soft words were spoken
Voices in the hallway rose and fell
They will do until our light is broken

Zimmerman

2011-05-27T15:10:00.000-07:00

World's coolest man
Synagogue gunslinger
High priest of the profane
Or merely a singer?

You took our worn-out words
Jangling beatnik long-hair
Gave the old songs a new run
Filled them with air

Playful, grandiloquent
Parading goodness and sin
Strutting, indifferent
Folk Judas – you plugged in

Holy cowpoke jester
Yeh, it was good what you done
But you ain't no Messiah
They're just songs. You just strum

Making a canoe

2011-05-20T06:55:00.000-07:00

You were the master of wood and glue
I would watch you, as a kid
And try to follow; I could not
I think of you, now, building my canoe

Now I know that your delight in wood
Was in the trueness of a straight line
In perfect joints, smooth as glass
In your plane – making things good

I would watch you, dad, as you
Poured your quiet strength into a task –
Strong shelves, fit for an elephant
I can’t do what you could do

I’m seeding the boat's imperfection
With each ill-judged line and cut
I am hoping it will float, but still
It would fail your inspection

Show me dad, please, let me see
You never did. Making was your thing
Not people – their imperfection
I was subdued by your mastery

Your square-tipped fingers made to till
Were the templates for mine. I look down
And see my clumsy fingers on the wood
I have your hands. I do not have your skill

Who am I?

2011-05-18T06:55:00.000-07:00

I surf a wave of despair

I’m damaged, fucked up, sad

If you’re afraid, I don’t care

I’m not just angry, I’m mad!

Can’t sing, can’t dance, can’t paint, can’t draw

That’s so passe. Done that, been there!

Being good at stuff is a bore

I am, like, hurt inside, yeh

If you interrogate my art

You’ll see it works conceptually

My genius? Where do I start?

Me me me me me me me me!

I wear my scars with pride

The artist’s pain, like Vincent

Come on my bare-knuckle ride!

In this tortured world I’m an innocent

Or am I? You will see ’em

As I turn a pound from this racket

Sex, decay, carpe diem –

The old tricks. I make a packet

I am out there; I’m feisty

My kind of thing is hot

Cos it’s, like, zeitgeisty

I’m a famous artist. You’re not!

The Railway Telegraph

2011-05-13T23:44:00.000-07:00

My father would have liked this hotel

Its shabbiness and faded aspiration

Years ago, the last train left the station

But no-one has told the clientele

It speaks to the edge of town – their dress

The blaring television and pool

The day-glo flyers, the poker school

The bar-huggers, one step from loneliness

Like moths drawn to a guttering flame

Gwen Dickey, the voice of Rose Royce

And Bob Marley – their music of choice

It was the kind of place to which he came

The Parkas and Rasta hats here say

Not failure but a colourful decay

The eternal battle

2011-05-04T13:20:00.001-07:00

In a lonely garrison
I fought for Emperor Hadrian
I was a Roman, on the wall
In my toga, standing tall
You – a Pict with attitude
Scrabbling in the dirt for food
Painted blue and flinging spears
You tied us up for several years

Another time we've met before
Was in the English Civil War
Me – Prince Rupert's mob on horses
You – the Lord Protector's forces
A serious genocidal crew
Abolished Christmas, dancing too
Your were very fond of bans
A bunch of zealous Puritans

Mid ’60s Brighton, 1st of May
Rockers and Mods – Bank Holiday
You – Ben Sherman and Sta-Prest
Me – greasy leathers, grubby vest
Doing the business with flick knives
Watched by a group of Teds, plus wives
Back to the smoke on your Lambretta
I burned you up, my bike was better

Another clash, another year
Puritan versus Cavalier
Short-haired punk or long-haired freak
Swinging chains down on the beach
Trad or bebop, fact or fiction
It's just a personal predilection
It always end up in a fight
And neither side is wrong, or right

Osama – an invitation

2011-05-04T02:49:00.000-07:00

Live in a nice cottage, a cave perhaps
Your staring eyes will arouse no fear
You can be a bigot without mishaps
It's regarded as quite normal up here

The wild moors will be your panorama
You can mumble death threats into your beard
Watch on your video a hate-filled drama
Stew in your bile; no-one will think it weird

Isolation will feed your extremism
Trips into town for a library book
Christianity and Islam – the schism
In the pub, a seat in the inglenook

In time, you will appreciate our ways –
Our stone churches, plain and austere
The dreary repetition of our praise
Our religion is bitter, like our beer

Whose that man, mummy, is it a farmer?
Is he from Hebden Bridge or Huddersfield?
No, my love, it's your uncle Osama
Folk from Yorkshire are his human shield

The world has gone mad

2011-05-03T06:56:00.000-07:00

Note: this a villanelle, hence the repetition. The form seemed to fit the content. We can only regret that the world has slid into a spasm of hatred, almost as Bloody as the Cold War. Essentially, the new polarity, draws upon a centuries-old conflict between Christianity and Islam. But aren't religions supposed to be about love?

Ecstatic crowds shout ‘USA!’

Exalted by an execution

The world has gone mad today

Is there no still voice to say

That revenge is no solution?

Ecstatic crowds shout ‘USA!’

For them, war is mere play

A bloody game of retribution

The world has gone mad today

Mad for the screaming lie

Of a final restitution

Ecstatic crowds shout ‘USA!’

The pale horse of death rides by

In its jaws, the constitution

The world has gone mad today

Interred at Gauntanamo Bay

The ideals of a revolution

Ecstatic crowds shout ‘USA!’

The world has gone mad today

Royal Wedding

2011-04-29T00:24:00.000-07:00

NB For a musical version of this poem, please click on My songs above

Let bells ring out from every steeple
For Arab kings who kill their people
Peers in ermine, standard bearers
Titled flunkeys, cassock wearers
The oligarchy and its muscle
Doing the Royal Wedding hustle

The BBC on bended knee
Lends a hushed servility
To this ritualised display
Of social inequality
Members of the fourth estate
Drooling at the rich man's gate

Old queens and aristos merge
There's Elton John, the demiurge
The orange, warbling royal pal
Sang at Diana's funeral
Wealth is the only qualification
For his elevated station

Cheers announce from every place

The dregs of a degraded race
The idle rich and hangers-on
In this ghastly marathon
Behind the gilded palace door
They are scroungers, not the poor

John Betjeman visits Peckham

2011-04-22T00:49:00.000-07:00

Sleek and red the sixty-three

Bicycles and vans converge

Peckham’s traffic mingled in

Cacophonous proximity.

The noisy vendors’ thrust and glare

Flows to the pulse of Africa.

Beauty is on offer here –

False eyelashes and human hair

Scrawny chickens and breadfruit

Mobile phone accessories

The ocean’s harvest, fresh and dried

Giant yams, cassava root.

Even the vegetable displays

Assault the eyes garishly

The crimson peppers shimmering

In an exotic cabaret.

Affirmed in passion and blood

The dance of life confirms

In texture and continuity

That existence itself is good.

And in the churches of Rye Lane

Hope is offered to the poor

In store-front Christianity
Christ has died, will rise again.

Note: in adopting this rhythm (as springy as a new mattress) I took on some of Betjeman's religiosity, although I didn't mean to, and his sentimentality. However, it's noticeable that Peckham's colour is scarlet and that it has more churches than pubs. I love the place.

The River Wreake, Brooksby

2011-04-21T00:27:00.000-07:00

What my life lacks is tranquility

People writhe like maggots to the top

And sink, and seethe in obscurity

Selling their CDs; it never stops.

A brief time away is all I ask

From this relentless self-expression –

London, where the poet’s lonely mask

Hides solipsism and depression.

Here, there are no angry commuters

Only the river's rippling green thread

No violent rhymes, no computers.
It's a peaceful return; instead

My canoe drifts between crack willows

The wind plucks at my sides and billows

My dog is gonna mess you up

2011-04-12T05:33:00.000-07:00

You've pissed me off wiv your attitude

You ain’t got no reason to stare

Like I was nuffink. It was rude

The way you was lookin at me … yeh.

Until then, I was gonna let it go

But then you’ve looked at me funny

You’ve done my ’ead in, bruv, and so

I’m gonna take your phone ‘an your money.

I ain’t no-one yeh, I’ve got rights

An’ so does my mate here, my pup

He’s the one what keep me safe at nights.

My dog is gonna mess you up.

Wiv the lead off, he is fissile

My dog is like a cruise missile.

Move on

2011-04-04T13:41:00.000-07:00

http://willhatchett.blogspot.com/p/my-songs.html

It’s time to move on
Time to succeed
Time to shed your friends

Like an old skin

It’s time to begin

Time to start again

You never stuck in the knife

I stuck it in my myself

Move on, don’t look back

It’s OK. I won’t make a fuss

Move along. There was no us

There was no arc

No walks in the park

We never held each other

In the dark

We never laughed

We never cried

There was no love

We never tried

Move on, cos you’re right

I am mediocre

Your light shines bright

An I am guttering out

Like a dead star

No fuss, don’t shout

I’m wrong you were right

Move on - tonight

Gm7

It’s time to succeed
Time to begin
A7

Shed your friends Like an old skin

Bb7 A7 Gm7

Move on ... move on

We never cried. We never laughed (same chord pattern)

Never held each other in the dark

Move on ... move on

Cm7 Gm7

Oh you never stuck in the knife. I stuck it in my myself

Cm7 D9 Eb9-D9
It’s OK. I won’t make a fuss. Because there was never us

Gm7

Move on

There was no love between us two An I will get over you

You will forget me soon, move on

Instrumental break over V chords x 2 then return to chorus chords

The time has come, I guess your right I'm a mediocrity

And now you star is burning bright I've got to get out of your light Move on

It’s time to succeed Time to begin Shed your friends

Like an old skin Move on ... move on

We never cried We never laughed Never held each other in the dark

Move on ... move on

The end has come cos it's your choice To pull the plug on us

Compared to you, I'm just a lout I wouldn't want to put you out. Move on

Instrumental to end

NB: A bath full of tears for the best interpreter of this song. It's a kind of fast rumba sung in the style of Jeff Buckley

It's not right

2011-04-04T13:03:00.000-07:00

For AJ

Why is the sky brown?
Why does trees grow down?
Why do snails bite?
Why do all babies
Love to fight?
Some things are not right.

Why do worms taste nice?
Why do cats like mice?
Why are clouds so strong?
Why do elephants sing
Such beautiful songs?
Some things are just wrong.

Why do squirrels glow?
Why do snakes like snow?

Why do horses moo?

And why is the grass

In the park so blue?

I don't know. Do you?

Why do sweets grow on trees?
Why do rabbits like cheese?
Why are clowns always sad
And why does chocolate
Taste so bad?
Some things are just mad.

Why do you want to be Miss Hip Hop Beauty UK?

2011-04-01T04:22:00.001-07:00

You ask the question, in response, I say

It's, currently, my top priority

Because the sky over Birmingham is grey

Because the house sparrows have gone away

Because I’m hot; because it’s my birthday

Because the linear notion of time

Was placed in jeopardy by Albert Einstein

And jus cos, well … it’s what I want, OK.

You say my desire lacks moral integrity

“Miss”,“hip hop” and “beauty”, you interject

Are all politically incorrect

And my main reason is a tautology.

You know what. I don’t care so … hey

I want to be Miss Hip Hop Beauty UK

A ringer. Petrarchan and Shakespearian sonnets welded together.

After Fukushima: 0de to Sir David King

2011-03-30T06:46:00.000-07:00

The sky is dark, I can’t breathe
Dead birds are falling from the trees
I know I am being naïve
About the polluted seas

I shouldn’t worry about
Persistent nuclear fallout
My fears are merely sophistry
I’ve learnt nothing from history

I’m an ignorant untutored one
Just a deluded simpleton
You’re the expert, David King
Nuclear power is your thing

You think this energy is “clean”
You like caesium and iodine
In the environment, one hopes –
Radioactive isotopes

You don’t fear mutagenicity
From this “cheap” electricity
The waste issue’s resolved
No terrorists. All problems solved

You’re the expert, David King
Nuclear power is your thing
It’s safer than poking a hornet’s nest
Nuclear power is the best

Eric Pickles' love child

2011-03-29T14:49:00.000-07:00

NB: Eric Pickles. British politician currently in charge of trashing local government and its services as part of David Cameron's Big Society

Under the pier
On a moonless night
The moment was right
He was like a steer
Mrs Pickles went wild
It was quite mild
For the time of year
I'm Eric Pickles' love child

In his old car
He had an eight-track
No Massive Attack
But James Last's orchestra
That car had no rust
They were wild with lust
Venus was their star
I'm Eric Pickles' love child

As they strolled along
The wind from the pines
Aroused them like wine
The sea was a song
A stifled shout
Lay the blanket out!
Their passion was strong
I'm Eric Pickles' love child

The sun, the sea
That moaned and
Crashed on the sand
Like a symphony
The warm, scented breeze
Like exotic poetry
He even looks like me
I'm Eric Pickles' love child

The British Way

2011-03-26T13:32:00.000-07:00

Revolution with hampers and tea-cups

I never thought that I'd see the red and black flag of anarchy flying over Fortnum and Mason's. A stirring sight!

Cairo, Tripoli and London today
Confronted by brute force, the state yields
But understatement is the British way.
The police, pushing us back with their shields,
Attempt to contain the revolution
Pink smoke blows down Burlington Arcade
Fortnum's displays an anarchist icon.
It's how our insurrections are made
With ironic slogans and paint, not tanks –
Take a sound system to your attack.
Masked youths, with sticks, flail at high street banks.
This season's colours are red and black.
In Old Bond Street, which shows the latest fashion
Thin young anarchists display their passion.

Stop the war

2011-03-23T13:55:00.000-07:00

Ensure that a foreign tyrant goes free.

We can protest, without a violent end

But of what value is our liberty?

He is a Socialist, therefore our friend.

Utopia is for another day

Democracy is far too us; too now.

You see, it must always be far away

In the doctrines of Lenin and Mao.

Their casual murder was justified

To guard the purity of communism

From the enemies at the gate, outside

From us – it was merely altruism.

Put on your t-shirt, comrade, take your side –

A fashionable kind of genocide.

The red and the green

2011-03-23T13:52:00.000-07:00

4/4 lively

G Bm
Shake a leaf for spring has come

C D
Just as she has before

C D
Smoke and pollen fill the air

G
It’s the time of the balladeer

C D

The saucy borage winks at us

G C
The hawthorn blossom’s here

D
The sun is a teasing friend

G
At this time of the year

Shall we follow, yes we shall

The May Queen knows our fear

We shall make a diadem

And place it in her hair

Policemen go the extra mile
And even prison wardens smile
It's not a time to swear or cuss
But to be of good cheer

Requiem

2011-03-15T07:30:00.001-07:00

For a vanished England. Uh-oh been listening to too much folk music 3/4 time

   G D G
The ploughboy and the milkmaid/Were walking one day
   D C Am D
When smoke from the factory/Did blacken their way
   C Am D7
And the dust from the motorcars/Has darkened the lane

G D G
We shall not see the old times/In the village again

D C Am D
Oh the cornflower and the poppy/And the violet so gay

C Am D7
And the hawthorn and the mallow/Are going away

G D G
Let us sing a sad requiem/For the Queen of the May

We have ruined the forest

With this greed of ours

The primrose, the anemone

The sweet woodland flowers

The hazel, the holly

The oak and the ash

Went into the sawmill

For the sake of some cash

Chorus

Yes, we’ve killed off the old ways

With our savage greed

The green man is dying

And all of his seed

The sky we have poisoned

The rivers run red

Even the skylark

In the meadow is dead

This news just in

2011-03-10T02:51:00.001-08:00

Above, Liz Hurley, actress. You only need to read one story. And this is it:

Tube strike nightmare – end in sight.
Embattled MP staring at

Political abyss, last night.

Secret shame of bureaucrat

In late-night, death-plunge mercy dash.

Sex-change MP is my brother

Town hall man sells wife for cash

Fury over Hurley’s lover.

Life inside for Satan’s vicars

Hurley man is pervy pest

Nightmare striker stole my knickers

In kinky town hall man’s love nest.

Vicars leap into abyss

Toy boy lover’s final kiss.

Weirdo pop perv

2011-03-09T14:16:00.000-08:00

Sicko paedo

Pop perv sex pest

London sex-game love nest.

Nightmare weirdo
Red-faced mogul

Sex-probe music sex-test.

London sex pest

Pop perve sicko

Sex-game love-nest paedo.

Red-faced music

Mogul sex-test
Nightmare sex-probe weirdo.

Just Go With It – Jen and Adam

2011-03-07T09:03:00.000-08:00

Sometimes there, sometimes not, it plays with us.
The sun's capricious at this latitude.
Casually, we hide our gratitude.
From a giant poster seen from the bus –
Exotic creatures in a heated tank –
Jen and Adam gaze at us, languidly.
They're looking from a place we'd like to be –
Clear skies, swimming pools, money in the bank –
America. They bring us something bright
It's a respite – a glimpse of liberty.
They don't have to worry, argue, or shout
Be thankful for blue water and sunlight
Or struggle to work, on the sixty-three.
Just Go With It, their latest film, is out.

Thanks to signor Petrarch for providing the form for this one. This is a film which I will not have to see, thankfully, as I am single. Hi to my friends in the US of A - and the Ukraine!

Rock at the Pawleyne Arms, Penge

2011-03-04T04:34:00.000-08:00

The local guitar slingers are all here
They are slightly frazzled from work and tax.
It’s a golden blur of music and beer –
Come down to the Pawleyne Arms; bring your axe.
Dionysius beats up Apollo
In cycles, new forms emerge from decay
Good times are replaced by bad tomorrows
But, here, the old songs don’t go away.
The riffs are passed on from father to son
Battered and polished like prized old guitars.
Peter Green, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton
Are remembered in these faded old bars.
Their hair is sparser now; these cavaliers
Revive the glories of their former years.

Penge is a suburb of London in the London Borough of Bromley. It is located 7.1 miles (11.4 km) south east of Charing Cross.
Shakespearian sonnet: robust, reliable old vehicle with a large capacity, like a VW camper.

Jeff Beck (pictured). Not as soulful as Peter Green or as flashy as Clapton; guitarist's guitarist.

I'm saving up rain

2011-03-03T04:29:00.000-08:00

For Paul

I’m saving up rain for a rainy day

The first signs of better weather have come

Winter is good because winter means grey

My idea of a great Bank Holiday

Is windows misted up, engine won’t run

I’m saving up rain for a rainy day

In my opinion, the sun is gay

With its cocktails and beach hats, which I shun

Winter is good because winter means grey

Soon, there will be lambs gamboling at play

And pigeons having x-rated fun

I’m saving up rain for a rainy day

A fierce gale blowing horizontally

Stiffens our British determination

Winter is good because winter means grey

Blue skies without clouds might take that away

That’s not what we want. And did I mention?

I’m saving up rain for a rainy day

Winter is good because winter means grey

Gaddafi

2011-03-01T03:12:00.000-08:00

Mainly, my people are no trouble

They are charming innocent children

It is my destiny to father them

My duty to teach them what is right

Sometimes, I chastise them, like all kids

With electric shocks and beatings at night

The false gods of the west are lures for them –

Education, freedom of speech, liberty –

And they are attracted by the Taliban

The glamour of the Jihad leads them astray

They really know how to party, those guys

With their long beards, drugs and Nescafe

You would like me, my friend, if you knew me

Tony found me a delightful host

In my Arab tent – if slightly flatulent

Tonight, it’s open palace in Tripoli

My grateful people are flocking round

See that guy with a rock – he loves me!

You helped me fill my Swiss account

Sold me your fighters and helicopters

You were kind over the Lockerbie thing

My allies were the far left and the rich

I was a pin-up boy for socialists

Did you know, I was born in a ditch?

Ballad of Naomi Campbell

2011-02-26T12:46:00.000-08:00

G Am D
Naomi, Naomi
C D
Down the catwalk you stride
C Cm G Em
Magnificent, obsidian
   C D7 G
You're glamour personified

V1
C D G Am
A tyrant gave you diamonds
   C D Em
In a court room you were tried
   Am D G Em
You said that they were dirty stones
   C D7 G
They said that you had lied

Instrumental break

G7 C   A7   D7 Eb7 D7

Repeat chorus

V2
In court you wore your darkest shades
To hide your hurt inside
You are a goddess after all
What does it matter who died?

Chorus
V3
Scouring Woolworths for a ring
Remember how you cried
It did not happen Naomi
You never were a bride

Baby boy

2011-02-26T06:32:00.001-08:00

To my beautiful grandson, Gianni

On the second day, the rain fell.

Siberian tiger in danger

Arab world still in flames.

Got to get up now, to rescue the tiger

Tell the Libyans what to do.

You just have to lie there looking cute.

Baby boy, l love you.

Rain is falling from an English sky.

Persistent it seeps into us.

It’s your heritage, sometimes, it goes away.

We do have sunshine, laughter and song.

We have left and right, right and wrong.

Quite often, picnics in the park.

Also, we have light and dark.

But you know that, lying

In the soft orbit of your mum

Perfect and pink, in the hot room

Where sweet tea and nurses come.

Don’t take my baby away.

Your mum's a bit of a tigress.

It’s a good thing, little one.

But her softness is the softest kind

Of soft to snuggle into.

There are birds, too. You’ll hear them sing

In the damp London trees.

On a February afternoon.

Got to go now, lot’s to do.

Baby boy, I love you.

Mac or Microsoft

2011-02-26T06:17:00.000-08:00

Note: the PC people won't like this. A state of conflict has existed between the Mac and PC communities for some time. I invite them to respond – in algorithms. I apologise for the rubbish rhyme in the first stanza.

For Tim

Microsoft is a rickety old train
Rattling along an antique track.
The coffee is scalding, the staff are rude
You can hear the engine puffin’.
Mac is a sleek Pullman –
Cappuccinos, a choice of muffins.

Mac is a stylish after dinner speech
With jokes, delivered without notes.
Microsoft is a manual an inch thick
A lecture, a humourless tirade
From a man in a suit –
The Communists are about to invade.

When Microsoft tries to party.
It gets it wrong; it never can.
Two drinks only, in bed by ten.
It tries to yoke wealth and knowledge.
Mac's an arts graduate
Microsoft did science at college.

Mac wears jeans and a casual shirt
Even on work days. But work;
What is that? It's messing about –
A new video, a great new app. Work is pleasure.
Microsoft makes Gates rich
It puts on its jeans for leisure.

Gotta make Gates some more billions.
Mac inhales and says ... yeh.
It has Polo shirts and floppy hair
The last Windows was crap, buy the next one
To fight the new virus.
A stern warning from the old puritan.

Marc is a sports car zipping along
The Pacific Coast Highway. It's all cool
Until a red light blinks. The engine explodes.
PC drives by. It's a battered old pick-up.
It's got the right tools but
It drives by. Sorry bro, can't fix you up.

Jamie's winners

2011-02-24T09:45:00.000-08:00

Jamie Oliver brings together some of Britain's most inspirational individuals [including Alastair Campbell] to see if they can persuade 20 young people who've left school with little to show for the experience to give education a second chance

NB: for non-UK readers Jamie Oliver is a celebrity chef. He's associated with one of the larger supermarket chains

Rich men pretending to be poor
Will take your money on the door
Campbell's lying don't come cheap
His fee would make you flipping weep
I can teach you Estuary
At my Fame Academy

Being a geezer isn't easy
There's an art to be being sleazy
I showed Nigella some new swerves –
How to profit from her curves
Ramsey's f word came from me
At my Fame Academy

How to swear, ’an ’ow to shout
How to get your ya yas out
People who excel at pouting
Chopping vegetables or grouting
Can brush up their skills – you'll see
At my Fame Academy

My school's where Bono ’an his crew
Learned how to swizz the Revenue
I showed Bob Geldoff what to do
I want your fookin’ money too
You can learn hypocricy
At my Fame Academy

Millionaires who drive Rollys Royces
Ask for help with soothing voices
Want to end this pain, they say
Phone this number straight away
Acquire fake sincerity
At my Fame Academy

Rich men pretending to be poor
Will take your money at the door
Allow celebs to travel free
By paying up your licence fee
And donate financially
To my Fame Academy

Ordinary man

2011-02-22T13:38:00.000-08:00

I'm not from the north
I'm not a woman
I'm not working class
I'm not black, I'm not gay
I'm not from any minority
I don't fancy pigeons
I'm not a pagan, or a wican –
I don't practice a religion
But, please – don't ignore me.
I'm not red, I'm not blue
I don't have a tattoo
I don't have a disability –
Apart from invisibility –
I'm an oppressed majority
My hair is fairly short
I don't like most sport
I cry quite easily
So please – don't ignore me.

I can't breathe fire, or juggle –

Usually, I'm no trouble –

I don't go after violent crooks

I return my library books

I know, I'm not on your list
The boxes aren't ticked

I'm a bit of a conformist

I'm not a priority
But please – don't ignore me.

I'm not a war hero. My net worth is zero
I don't have a cheesy smile
I can't run a four-minute mile
I don't wear a hat
Your values won't be under attack

Unless you're a paedophile

I'm not ancient, or a juvenile

I don't have silver cutlery
So please – don't ignore me.

Snowdrops

2011-02-22T07:37:00.001-08:00

Explanatory note: recently, I've been trying to trace my ancestry in villages in the midlands – Hugglescote, Ravenstone, Edingale – traipsing around churchyards. The Hatchetts were farmers and bootmakers, in a rural area close to the Leicestershire coalfied. The countryside is not pretty, but it's not ugly. Most recently, I visited a place called Croxall on the Derbyshire Staffordshire border. There's no village there now; just a manor house and a Medieval church. Very picturesque. The church is hidden in woodland; the River Mease, which is little more than a brook, runs by it. It's a shared church, without a congregation. Winter evening. Lengthening shadows. Masses of gleaming white snowdrops. No Hatchetts.

To Zoe

Close to Bosworth Field, I finally arrive
At the village of Croxall, a lowering sky
Broods over the manorial estate –
Woodlands, a muddy farm track, a gate.
The neat woodstacks and twisted chimneys
Show an enclosed order, alien to me.
Somehow, I am oppressed by the fields and trees.
I am a stranger here. I seek patrimony.
Maybe an ancestor trod this narrow track
A church warden, perhaps; now I'm back.

The church beckons me. Am I going home?
England is written in its soft grey stone
Faded and creased, like an old diagram.
Perhaps it will tell me who I am.
With its carved alabaster, it's a relic
Of pious times, a Gothic antique –
Breathing, from an exposed gaping crypt
The musty residue of the departed.
The church is halfway towards ruin.
Straining at broken panes, I peer in.

On the old graves, where the past is frozen
A carpet of snowdrops – a white explosion.
I seek meaning, trying to disinter the dead.
Nothing. Sometimes, the past cannot be read.
With a sense of regret, I close the book
Return from the crumbling church and the brook
To the car. Often, the past hides from us
In wild places, smothered by moss and rust
Wherever we go, however hard we try.
The ancient village is lost, so am I.

Berlin or Bournemouth

2011-02-21T00:35:00.000-08:00

Sausages and leather trousers
Conversation and good beer
Culture – and the women!
Where am I? You are in Berlin

Where are the striped deck-chairs
The doughnuts, the faded pier?
Excuse the expression on my mouth
I thought I was in Bournemouth

Cold War

2011-02-20T04:04:00.000-08:00

To Dawn

The resolute grey of an English Sunday
There's very little to warble about
Nature is shrivelled, the sky grey
Like subdued pensioners, the plants don't shout
Frozen buds, a half-hearted forsythia
Merely announce their intention to bloom
There's a cataract across the sky
We look out, hopefully, from dark rooms
The sun is an unreliable fiance
Dead leaves lie still on the ragged lawn
Like a failed suitor, it seeks our pardon
And the poor chiff-chaff, why did it come this way
To deliver its happy, liquid song?
It chirps forlornly in an English garden

Bullies: the grip of state control

2011-02-19T07:21:00.000-08:00

NB: Villanelle. Cameron is number two

They are going after the hospitals and schools
The news worsens with each passing day
Really, do they think we are fools?

It's the rich who are re-writing the rules
They don't like paying taxes, apparently
They are going after the hospitals and schools

As well as the libraries and swimming pools
And you can forget your council tenancy
Really, do they think we are fools?

They have the intention and the tools
To unbolt the Welfare State. Is that OK?
They are going after the hospitals and schools

When the Mail kicks up their ardour cools
Education is defined as a luxury
Really, do they think we are fools?

To make a country that's fit for ghouls
They are giving the whole shooting match away
They are going after the hospitals and schools
Really, do they think we are fools?

British tear gas

2011-02-18T14:11:00.000-08:00

Hundreds of cartridges of tear gas and other riot control equipment have been licensed for export to the Gulf kingdom in recent months, Foreign Office Minister, Alistair Burt, said.
Sky News, 18 February, 2011

British tear gas – excellent
It's far the best you see.
We're champions at crying
It's made from synergy.

It's great for others but the gas
Has worked for us for years.
It converts our angry mobs
Into blubbing babies – cheers.

The gas was perfected
In UK laboratories
By specialists in weeping
And lachrymosity.

We're born to disappointment
And not to liberty;
Bad weather, disgusting food
And only partially free.

The quince is our idea of fruit
We tolerate pollution.
We're too polite to have a crack
At income redistribution.

Cut to a fireworks display
The disappointed crowds.
Here, the sky is rarely seen
It's covered by dense clouds.

The true poet

2011-02-18T08:26:00.000-08:00

The true poet is a pacifist
Probably gay, quite often pissed
Look at Auden, Benjamin Britten
Britten wrote music – you get the gist!

Both fucked off to America at
The first whiff of powder – not brave that
But both did service to the Muse
Wore her laurels, with pride in fact

Orwell's the stranger on this list
Puritan, hero, novelist
Brave as a lion, fought in Spain
It's a good job that the bullet missed

Why I write

2011-02-17T06:48:00.000-08:00

Explanatory note: a grey morning, oozing with mist. I was walking down Roupel Street SE1, past the nostalgic bakery. It's a railway workers' terrace converted for use by today's inner-city rich – MPs and TV producers – a very retro sreet. You can see into the tasteful, expensive interiors, sitting and dining rooms knocked through, stripped floors, rugs. I thought – I'm in the 1930s! Of course, I don't remember them. But I remember people who did and, through stories and memories, they are in range of my imagination. The poem explains my prediliction, in theatre, for vicars and French windows. I have had enough Marxism shoved down my throat in drama, particularly at university, to last me for a lifetime. Hardly fashionable (come to think of it, Marxism is no longer fashionable) but I don't care these days. I have crossed the meridiem.

Glimpsed through long windows, a sitting room.
Curtains blowing in, a vase, polished floorboards
The past is fascinating; it is my loom.
The burnt dust smell of an old gramophone
Droitwich on the wireless dial, fur coats, mothballs.
The cracked leather chairs in my grandmother's home.

People knew their place in life, where to sit –
Colonel, vicar or bank manager.
I like the past. In fact, I remember it.
It is frozen in time, like a wax tableau
Providing an eternal narrative
Comic and tragic. The past is where I go.

You don't need swearing to put on a show
The crude embarrassment of agitprop
Stage nudity, or violence, although
I do like them – a lot. I prefer to shop
In old-fashioned establishments that project
Calm, not chaos. The past is where I stop.

Build a canoe out of plywood

2011-02-17T02:32:00.000-08:00

To Valerie

This is the craft to suit your dreams
It is the design that you seek
Only a few tools are required
You should have her built in a week

Miracles can happen in sheds
Air can be contained, wood can bend
There's somethiing magic about it
With a canoe, you can transcend

Men do things like that. Patiently
It's an antidote to sorrow
Slowly, at night, she will emerge
Shining, beautiful and hollow

Now, push your craft onto a lake
Or sea loch, an emerald bay
Floats like a dream, prow a shark fin
All your troubles will float away

Creep

2011-02-16T04:26:00.000-08:00

Explanatory note: may be a real person, may be made up. Maybe a bit of both.

You may not have heard of him yet

This hero on the internet

The English guy who writes cool books –

Leather jacket, bad boy looks

Or host invites you, take a stroll

Through his virtual goldfish bowl

Buy the tee-shirt, walk the walk

Marvel at his table talk

His life's entirely free of trouble

His manner's easy, like his stubble

The modest guy who won the race:

“Right now my novel's in first place”

His accent's vaguely American

He'll reply to you, if he can

His meekness is a handy pose

He's a wolf-man in sheep's clothes

Behind his charming smile, a sneer –

Another prize, another year

“Yesterday, we bought a rug.

My cat is sleeping.” God how smug

His blog and website are his life

His perfect kids, his perfect wife

Millions choose to peer inside

Mass adulation feeds his pride

A Horatian Ode upon Ms Tara Palmer-Tomkinson's nose

2011-02-15T10:24:00.000-08:00

I want a new nose for the Royal wedding says ex-coke addict Tara Palmer-Tomkinson

By SARA NATHAN and BEN TODD
Mail Online. Last updated at 12:01 PM on 24th February 2011

NB: with thanks to my hero, Andrew Marvell, master of the tetrameter

It is a mess for all to too see
Your ruined nasal cavity
Your hope the tragedy
Of plastic surgery

Barely knowing where you were
You giggled in Frank Skinner's chair
Blinded by your need
You thought he was Mike Reid

You fled the paps from bar to bar
And flashed your thighs leaving your car
But your exotic pose
Was outshone by your nose

Too much charlie hoovered up it
Floppy like a finger puppet –
The septum burned away
From your five grams a day

To enjoy a flower's scent
Is a kind of sacrament
But your organ of smell
Is trashed; it's gone to hell

Like Westbrook, the celebrity
There is a hole where yours should be
You're pictured in Hello
A casualty of snow

Time thief

2011-02-13T04:19:00.000-08:00

Explanatory note: this poem came from three main sources. The first was Wayne Rooney's extraordinary overhead kick goal, scored on the 12th of February, in a game between Manchester United and Manchester City. The second was a reference on a radio programme to Rilke's sonnet sequence devoted to Orpheus (I had never heard of these poems before). The third was subliminal. The radio was softly playing as I slept, fitfully, conveying the infamies of the world on the BBC – Christians slaughtering Muslims, and vice versa. All three congealed in my mind, in some lines and rhymes. I wanted to write a sonnet. I have not used Rilke's form but, crudely and inexpertly, that of Petrarch.

You take, easily, what the others seek
In fact, you make them look half-asleep
You are like quicksilver – a time thief
Your glorious exploits bookmark the week.
Like the rest of us you must talk, eat –
A mixture or cliche and modesty –
On the dreaming field, you're a deity.
The white football is a world at your feet.
On this planet of ours much is wrong –
Too much violence and stupidity.
It all vanishes when you play for us.
Your game is like a beautiful song.
It banishes fear and cupidity.
You are no satyr, you are Orpheus

In praise of intolerance

2011-02-05T07:14:00.001-08:00

Explanatory note: this poem is based on Wendy Cope's Engineers Corner.

What this country needs is ignorance

Let the unenlightened have their say

Liberals have led us on a merry dance

Let's close down all the libraries, today

Yes, political correctness has gone mad

Modern fads have made us too tolerant

The increase is knowledge is really sad

Too much kindness, a reason to rant

We should put prejudice back on the bus

Make casual racism our position

Foreigners are funny – not like us

Human rights an alien imposition

At first, it was only the students in the town

It's spreading now, from Cornwall to the Fens

Bolshiness is up, obedience down

We are subjects of the Crown, not citizens!

Let's return corporal punishment to schools

Put an end to this naive innocence

Remember good old flogging – Maggie rules!

Turn Britain blue as Stilton, it makes sense

The boys from Loaded

2011-02-05T02:36:00.000-08:00

Explanatory note: I used to drink in the same pub as this man, the Stamford Arms in SE1, as it happens, and his obsequious crowd of stubbled wannabes and girly girls, when the magazine publishers, IPC, were near my office. Sky sports on the big screen, lager, blokeiness – cool Britannia had become cruel Britannia. See the dead look in his zombie eyes. The poem is my first attempt at that old favourite, terza rima.

Look at him, that person that you see

Yeh him – he's the coolest guy alive

With his fags, booze and vulgarity

At least until the next one arrives

His acolytes laugh at his jokes

And the “birds” gaze into his brown eyes

He is the king of the uber-blokes –

The Loaded crew, post-ironic

There is no sexism for them, folks

Perhaps it is merely moronic

But, for now, watch the man with the quiff

For his cruelty is iconic

Being a crude bully is his riff

Danny Dyer – thespian

2011-02-02T08:41:00.000-08:00

The place was full of flippin’ thieves
There was Winstone, king of geezers
An’ Ritchie, wiv ’is wicked scar
We was neckin’ Bacardi Breezers

We was doin’ the old verbals
When this bloke turns up, bony runt
Do you know who I fuckin’ am?
It's only Micheal Gambon, the ------

No, I says, I'm joshin’ ’im, see
Well, ’e says, you will soon
You're playing against me, darling
At the National Theatre, in June

You're ’avin a laugh, mate, I says
Do you know who I flippin’ am?
’E looks back at me, the twat
I ain't no effing nonce, I'm Dan

Time of the toad – ode to Alastair Campbell

2011-01-31T15:41:00.000-08:00

Alastair Campbell still thinks it was right

To invade Iraq – the pornographer-in-chief

Still spouting the same, self-serving bullshit

The foul-mouthed spin-doctor was Tony's boy

His unhinged Messianic self-belief

Echoes that of his master, Mister Blair –

Whose moral crusade besmirched the UK –

Known as the “Middle East peace envoy”

Campbell was famous for four-letter tirades

Against other people in the media

Made the BBC ready for Murdoch

Attacked Gilligan, in the name of “lies”

He goes on believing; he's not ashamed

Mythologising his own part in history

Does he sleep soundly, without a trace of guilt?

Because of Blair, a hundred thousand died

Who put the light on?

2011-01-31T11:48:00.000-08:00

NB: Triolet

Someone has put the light back on
I thought that it had disappeared
You remember that thing – the sun?
Someone has put the light back on
It offers us protection
It removes our night-time fears

Someone has put the light back on

I thought that it had disappeared

The bright half

2011-01-31T11:34:00.000-08:00

It's not that the winter is longer

Although it seems so

Its grip on the soul is stronger

Harder to endure

The consolation of days is

Still available

Certainly – the chatter of friends

But heard more faintly

We grow old; the night gives relief

Coveted, not sought

It's dangerous now. It has

Death in its embrace

Each year we leave the bright half with

A little less hope –

Fall into the dark, not knowing

If we will come out

Ode to Rupert

2011-01-27T05:22:00.000-08:00

To Tom

And so, the old Moloch is moving in

His sterile mission to accumulate –

His burnt offerings are being prepared –

To monetise the assets of the state

Britain's being re-made for millionaires –

A Rupert-friendly Big Society –

The asset-strippers waiting at the gates

We're all in this together – except me

He would place a pay gate up in heaven

So as to exclude the poor, if he could

He's widening the eye of the needle

Murdoch is a Puritan; greed is good

There's plenty of sweet prey for the old beast

The problem in Britain is quality

He does satellite slush, sport and crap news

They buy a licence – for the BBC!

He likes the sneer of the playground bully

Requires his papers to pick on the meek

The world is merely his Monopoly board

I think I'll buy a new country this week

Eton Dave is putting the hours in

He is carefully crafting a new breed

A nation of servile proletarians

And country houses, where the rich succeed

Football is ballet

2011-01-24T08:48:00.000-08:00

This pub is London's unfriendliest scene

I'm merely waiting
The decor is brown and corrupted maroon

Like a diseased lung
Stacked chairs, like a junk shop or lumber room
Blue neon glowing
A pool table's violent shade of green

The pub flies the local team's tattered flag
In a faded display
Of embattled and proud hostility
It's hardly gastro
Seriously, it needs a makeover

The locals don't care

Grimy authenticity is is their bag

A giant screen dominates every angle

As the flat-capped men
With their grunts, four letter words and pints, seek
Amber oblivion
Watching inarticulate millionaires
Prod a small white ball
Gracefully, around a green rectangle

Bravely, I request some food and coffee
No? Do you have crisps?
A grudging yes from the barman, he's the
Tormentor-in-chief
These people's lives lack colour, poetry –

Football is ballet
For Christ's sake don't tell them. They would kill me

The wrong kind of luxury

2011-01-16T04:12:00.000-08:00

Tonight at Ford we'll all go wild

Cos the salsa is too mild

The glaring faults are there to see

There ain't no silver cutlery

Frozen croissants - please don't start

We're takin' this friggin' place apart

I knew weird things were going on

When they brought my filet mignon

'You call this steak well done,’ I said

'What colour is that, yeh? It's red

It just ain't good enough, you arse

An' what about my drama class?'

It's not just that they feed us sparsely

Only three kinds of friggin' parsly

Or that the wine list is deficient

The cultural offering insufficient

The Feng Shui is a friggin' disgrace

My emotions are all over the place

Been banged up for a year and half

I still ain't had a scented bath

This place is a friggin' liberty

An' whatever you think, it ain't just me

Last week, the tomatoes weren't sun dried

I hugged big Vernon, as he cried

He misses his music and his nan

Big Vern is a Schoenberg man

He yearns for the emotional schism

Of polytonal serialism

Take a man like that and feed him drivel

His soul is going to waste and shrivel

I told the screw – I ain't being Orphic

Vernon is culturally polymorphic

Ford Open Prison, tonight we go gaga

Ain't drinkin' no more Tesco's lager

This place is an indignity

It's the wrong kind of luxury

Winter villanelle

2011-01-15T07:51:00.000-08:00

For Sarah

Today's a day for being in

It's supposed to be a holiday

To do nothing is not a sin

Like a feral pigeon's wing

The sky's a million shades of grey

Today's a day for being in

Some rotter has stolen my zing

The swine's taken my energy

To do nothing is not a sin

On these occasions, the best thing

Is an absorbing radio play

Today's a day for being in

Scrunched-up paper misses the bin

Even though it's four feet away

To do nothing is not a sin

Well, that's my opinion

It justifies my lethargy

Today's a day for being in

To do nothing is not a sin

Why oh why?

2011-01-13T10:41:00.000-08:00

I saw the snowdrop thief today

Lurking in the shrubbery

Tube strike threatens royal wedding

Can't be bothered to change my bedding

Conditions are dismal, cold and grey

Across most parts of the UK

Everything's bad, not just the weather

Bankers have taken all the treasure

If Murdoch wins his little war

Radio 4 will be no more

The government's making a mighty mess

Of Bevan's dream the NHS

The cost of onions is soaring

Every film I see is boring

Disease, famine, fire and flood

Fire fighters engulfed by mud

The Martians are about to attack

And my boomerang won't come back