Experience

These three flew too close to the sun

but now in their embroidered finery
they are pinned to the dust of history
glowing faintly in a junk shop window.
Their crushed velvet rebellion
that once burned so brightly
seems like a trick of memory.
Did it happen? Now all are gone.
Like three tropical deities
they play on. Squandered royalties
and blown amps don’t matter now.
Answering a muse higher than poetry
with their amazing musical alchemy
Jimi, Mitch and Noel: their last show.

Victory party

I came to play you my guitar

Like I done for Obama

I’ve never had no beef with tax

And I’ve made millions with this axe

I know that you have come real far

But I ain’t playing for no liar

The good guys lost, the bad guy won

The hopes we had are overthrown

Now that jackass orange clown

Is gonna run this frikkin town

To celebrate his victory

Would waste electricity

So dim the lights and close the show

We lost, the party’s over now

I aint gonna sing no song

So to all of you so long

The good guys lost, the bad guy won

The hopes we had are overthrown

Now that jackass orange clown

Is gonna run this frikkin town

Hymn to Karl Marx

who are you to defy my authority?

that which cannot be measured does not exist

nothing can lie outside my analysis

the iron law of the empiricist

your vague impressions of beauty

are as elusive as an infant’s kiss

and your strange magic, the Eucharist:

beauty is the tyrant’s nemesis

I am the destroyer of symphonies

I will turn your Parnassus 

into a blighted wilderness 

so put your muse on out-of-office

of your fragile ghost I am the exorcist

that which cannot be measured does not exist

That which cannot be measured

That which cannot be measured does not exist:

your staring out of the window, your daydreaming

your jack in the box ‘imagination’ –  a will o' the 
wisp.

All are unproductive. Ergo, you have failed the test

There are no metaphors on a balance sheet.
Your ‘creativity’ is as elusive as the Eucharist.
It is, as best, a faded scroll, a mere palimpsest.
That which cannot be measured does not exist.

Unwind your spring, do not construct analogies

or let your restless mind concatenate.

Let this Excel spreadsheet record you

noting, merely, your presence, your absences.

All of that time, you could have been elsewhere

writing your poetry and your symphonies.

To the ghost in the machine, I am the exorcist.

That which cannot be measured does not exist.

1984

For weeks as the sharp cold tightens his skin
he hunches over the lexicographical machine.
Each typed sheet is laced with streams of graphite
like a desiccated spider. Tap tap tap. Cough.
More blood. Likely his death sentence: a haemorrhage.

He ventures out only to watch the slate sea and the white fulmars'
graceful economy. This strange world – an infinity of grey.
Hunchbacked, in the cold kitchen
he puffs on his hand-rolled muse like a true proletarian.
On the white page he can engrave
the gold of Valencia, the crimson banners of the dead.
 
With coloured plates he illustrates
sadistic commissars, the idiocy of ideologies.
To make them mean more, a novel.
His eyes peer down a wrong-way telescope
on slogans, burial pits and victory parades.
A whole century was betrayed.

He sees the overflowing sink. He touches his bullet wound.
Puff puff puff. Tap tap tap. Wrong-way telescope. Century betrayed.
Should he smoke? Of course.
He will finish this cigarette and thousands  more.
Smoke in, blood out.
And the book? He chipped it out from granite
with his bare hands. He could do no more.

The pages go to proofs then plates.
His stained fingers are as orange as cinnamon.
They run off the first books when he is in hospital
in his wedding bed, shortly before his funeral.
His melancholy face smiles faintly, greeting them
Like lost children. Cough.
He did not stop. He finished it.

From each small death he built a larger one.
He did not stop. From Jura granite he chipped it out
from stone to paper, paper to stone.
The final book his adamantine memorial.

 

 

Partisan's song

Nothing ever happened round here.

We passed our dull lives invisibly.

We lived on luncheon meat and gassy beer

in drab suburban conformity.

Their advanced forces approached stealthily.

Quietly, they moved from street to street

as their prim curtains twitched digitally:

a new web page, a Facebook post, a tweet.

They brought a gluten-free economy

in which coffee was drunk openly

a cheese shop, a microbrewery:

the food fads of the almost wealthy.

Soon, they opened a cozy bistro

where lovely girls strummed on guitars

and people ate goats’cheese and prosciutto.

Buggies came and muffins on our bars!

When Zumba arrives, estate agents follow.

Our cheap lager was a fading memory.

The boozer’s gone; it’s Foxtons now.

There is nowhere to be sullen and lonely.

The wine tasting classes were the last straw.

We established a bridgehead at Poundland.

We wanted our lives back, as before.

But it was too late. There was nothing to defend

Ye Tudor Tower Blocke

Made from finest English yew and oak

Standing tall, her quality bespoke

Her fifty floors are smoothed with daub and wattle

She rises proud and slender as a bottle

Ivy-covered and topped with thatch

Home to summer swallow and nuthatch

She is higher than the tallest tree

The shining jewel of London’s liberty

For pilgrim, knight or royal VIP

A priceless gift: peace and security

For wealthy merchant, squire or nobleman

A slice of London glamour, bought off plan

Here the cool and fashionable invest
For who would not desire an eagle's nest?

Exotic pleasures follow from their lease
The nightly chatter of Winchester geese

Turning his wooden crank, the spit rotator

Will hoist you upwards in the elevator

Enjoy the city spreading out below

The sparkling river Thames and Shakespeare’s O

We have the perfect place to meet and greet

So raise your tankard in the Marlow suite

For those who wish to keep their bodies trim

The building has a jousting mini gym

Before you leave, we hope that you will stop

To fill your trencher in Ye Turnip Shoppe

A high-rise chapel offers benediction

Except to those of Papist disposition!

Or, in ceaseless prayer from morn to night

To save your soul, a private anchorite

Just as man is host to flea and louse

Your animals are welcome in this house

A well-swept stall for stallion and mare

The freshest straw, because our ostlers care

Ye South Banke is now a national treasure

A favoured spot for tourism and leisure

Here from far and wide the people flock

To see a show or fighting bear or cock

To raise the roof, or fornicate or drink

And hear the groaning prisoners in the Clink

Pause here to freshen up and change your ruffle

Before enjoying theatre or brothel

Whether you dine on venison or pottage

We know that you will love our aerial cottage!

Numbers or words

Although numbers do not tell stories

as graphically as words do

both can murder efficiently –

Both numbers and words can kill you.

Behind the tyrant on the balcony

sits an unsmiling accountant

listening to his oratory

with the cold heart of the merely numerate.

His story may be less colourful

a narrative that only he can see

but death is hiding in his ledgers

he can subtract you from history.

Evil does not require empathy.

He is a true master of infamy.

Ballad of Labour

This chequered history is us
So climb aboard the battle bus

Welsh orator and fiery Scot
Labour’s history has the lot

Noble lord and miner’s son
Hard drinker and puritan

Stafford Cripps was of that ilk
He dined on oatmeal and sour milk

But Harold Wilson’s pal, George Brown
Was the biggest drunk in town

The mighty shipyards turned to rust
The General Strike, Keir Hardie’s dust

James Maxton and ‘Red Clydeside’
The Jarrow marchers, all inside

Heroes, when the war was won
Bevan, Silkin, Morrison

Bevin from the TUC
Hugh Dalton and Clem Attlee

Labour’s women linger still
Like Dr Edith Summerskill

Feisty Castle, Bessie Braddock
Pioneering Diane Abbott

Ruddock from the CND
Shirley Williams, SDP

Jowell, Harman, Hodge and Walley
And in bright scarlet Follett, golly!

Also from New Labour’s years
Yvette Cooper and Hazel Blears

Rebels mark our history
Like Poplar’s mayor, George Lansbury

There is nothing new to war
The party has been here before

Warrior of pacifist
Each can be a socialist!

Lost leaders are written here
The tarnished king, MacDonald’s heir

The thief of Baghdad, Tony Blair
(Now a lonely millionaire)

And heroes lost to history
John Smith died young, a tragedy

Mo Mowlam and Robin Cook
Their names are written in the book

Tony Crosland’s heart gave out
Or he would have had a shout

Whose this come to join the show?
The Welsh firebrand, Kinnochio

He might have won, but for that night
When he swaggered – ‘Well alright!’

Some were fiery, some were bland
Here comes young Ed Miliband

Read the diaries of great men
Dick Crossman and Tony Benn

Some dodgy geezers got the sack
Stephen Byers and ‘Junket Jack’

Labour is a mosaic still
Of wealthy men, like Hugh Gaitskell

Heroes from the lower strata
Prescott, with his chipolata

And others who are far from grand–
Alan Johnson and his band

From council hall and union
Heffer, Dobson, Livingstone

(Once against an ‘EU state’
Now he is an apostate)

Economics brought us down
Before the days of Balls and Brown

Healey at the IMF
The crash of sterling, what a mess!

The right wing press’s ill intent
The dead unburied, discontent

To cope with strikes a master plan
‘In place of strife’, James Callaghan

From public school and tough estate
Each new pretender at the gate

To win the race must learn to fight
Trim to the left or back to right

New Labour, well their day is done
Blunkett, Straw and Mandelson

But will the tribe of Jeremy
Learn from Labour’s history?

Fly fishing in Bromley

for Adam

The lake pulls my nerves taut
like a mirror of my heart –
a reflection of hidden jeopardy.

I cast my line and draw it tight
Darkness is falling. Why would I
plant my best shoes in the mud

to test a half-forgotten skill
against an unseen enemy
if not tugged by an ancient memory?

For it is not normal to kill.
It is as if something in me
is seeking to stop time itself.

The cruel world below
is slimy and bestial.
Man eats pike, pike eats minnow.

Perhaps it is just evolution.
Bigger fish are tormenting me
and so, in staring into this mirror

I am merely passing hurt down the line
although I have no need to –
to inflict pain on an invisible foe.

Battle of the mill pond

Armour-plated, living in shadow
you were the monarch of Coltsford Mill
a giant among minnows
the true lord of alder and willow.
Made of cartilage and muscle
you loomed over your retinue
through your lonely kingdom of mud –
in the season of mayfly and swallow.
Testing your royal blood and sinew
you flashed to air like a silver lance
in the last battle that you fought.
The wedding guests glimpsed you.
They admired your aqueous existence
until the day that you were caught.

What I could be doing

In some lonely office world

the latest problems are obscured

by jargon witten on a board –

nonsense scribbled on a wall.

Let flip-charts flip and markers scrawl

because I could be fishing now.

This man like a scratched record

with stationery profanes the word

of Abraham and Solomon.

The air is thick with tedium.

Where pupae hatch and spiders crawl

you know I could be fishing now.

Meanwhile, in some London suburb

silent in their prison yards

the yummy mummies exercise.

Let lonely runners pavements plough.

Let clippers clip and mowers mow

because I could be fishing now.

Waves of chatter bathe us all

like an electric cloud

in layers of banality.

I could escape through a green door
while files upload and pixels glow.

You know I could be fishing now.

Death in Sydenham

The magnolias were wilting
The devil was not at the crossroads
Or even in the room
Tumble weed blew across the road
Somewhere in the desert it snowed
The night that Adam killed the blues

The angels were weeping, so were were the screws
Muddy Waters looked down at his shoes
Clarence ‘Gatemouth’ Brown was sick
John Lee Hooker dropped his pick
Memphis Minnie phoned her nan
The night that Adam killed the blues

Blind Lemon Jefferson was embarrassed
Big Bill Broonzy was unimpressed
Lightnin’ Slim and Pee Wee Hughes
Were devastated by the news
Robert Johnson was quite distressed
The night that Adam killed the blues

Duane Allman said to Stevie Ray:
‘He can’t sing he can’t play!’
Eric Clapton on holiday
Made a call to Robert Cray
‘I can’t believe he’s done it man!’
The night that Adam killed the blues

Peter Green showed sympathy
But tears were shed in Sydenham
Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee
Drove off in a campervan
Albert Lee was not amused
The night that Adam killed the blues
 

The three kings: Freddy, Albert and BB
asked each other: ‘how could he?’
Word spread quickly across the south
From Purley Way to Beckenham
Howling Wolf actually howled
The night that Adam killed the blues

The glass tower

It  rose up like a shining needle
The great glass tower was filled with air
Strangers spied ghostly shapes through the walls
It was empty – no-one lived there
People came and clamoured outside
Because they were cold and needed shelter
One of them knocked on the door
And tried to get in. There was no answer
The bankers were on beaches; their helpers
Lived behind high walls like mirrors
Although it was clearly unfair
There was no-one to help the poor
More crowds, more homeless people, year on year
More towers were built and filled with air

From cottage estates to A Clockwork Orange

Blink and you missed it. Held as part of Clerkenwell design week, a photographic exhibition at the London Metropolitan Archives, ‘Somewhere decent to live’, held in May, celebrated almost a century of council housing built by the London County Council.

It’s a rich and varied tradition. Set up in 1889, the LLC used its powers under the Housing of the Working Classes Act of 1890 to create housing schemes on newly-cleared slum sites.
Opened in 1900, the Boundary Estate in Bethnal Green (shown in the exhibition) housed 5,000 people in five-storey tenement blocks, with shops, a laundry and a club-room. This high-density housing model, not for poorest but for those on artisans’ incomes, had already been demonstrated by the Peabody Trust. But, assisted by government subsidies from 1919, the LCC was to become a far larger and bolder landlord than the philanthropic housing charities of the Victorian and Edwardian eras.

Built in the ‘arts and crafts’ style the Totterdown fields, White Hart Lane and Old Oak housing schemes were prototype council estates of two and three-bedroom ‘cottages’ with parlours, on the then fringes of London. The LLC got into its stride in the 1920s. Among its 90,000-odd new ‘homes fit for heroes’ in the inter-war period were Becontree – straddling the boroughs of Barking and Dagenham, the largest council estate in the world.

Inspired by the Greater London Council’s Home Sweet Home exhibition of 1973, ‘Somewhere decent to live’ combined photographs of newly-completed developments with continuous projection of films made by the LCC and, from 1965, the GLC. The touchingly dated films advertise their now anachronistic aim ‘to relieve overcrowding and to make sure that people who have no real home are decently housed, as soon as possible’.

In the LCC’s County Hall offices planners, surveyors, architects and even sociologist once bent over plans and models, toiling to convert their visions of the future into reality – aerial roads, walkways in the sky – nothing was off-limits.

By the 1950s, the LCC’s architects’ department, called ‘the hothouse’ was the largest in the world. Its professionals had scoured the continent for inspiration. They found it in the workers’ housing of socialist Vienna, in Scandinavian modernism and even in Le Corbusier’s later derided ‘ville radieuse’ (which found a faint echo in the Loughborough Road estate in Lambeth).

Daring to hope for a better world and to embrace the new, LCC and GLC architects changed London’s streetscapes irrevocably with their neo-Georgian walk-up blocks, modernist slabs and points and scissor-section maisonettes. They built ambitious overspill housing schemes in Andover, Haverhill, Huntingdon and Thetford. In Thamesmead, from 1965, they even aspired to create a ‘town of the future’.

By the 1970s, professionals were experimenting with h0using floor-plans that could be specified by tenants. But the tide was turning against them, especially after the Ronan Point explosion in 1968. Their utopian dreams were now portrayed as ‘high-rise hells’. Symbolically, Thamesmead was used as backdrop for Stanley Kubrick’s dystopian film, A Clockwork Orange.

Once neo-Liberalism came to dominate the political landscape, state institutions and their architecture could only be disregarded. London’s strategic authority was abolished in 1986 just before its centenary. County Hall became a hotel and the GLC’s proud architectural heritage was discredited and largely forgotten.

In an age in which dreams are derided, only bad things are thought to come from Europe and communal responsibility to the poor has been replaced by rampant individualism, it was good to be reminded, in these quaint photographs and films, if only for three days, that things were once different.

Somewhere Decent to Live London’s Council Estates in Photographs, 1895 to 1975, 24 to 26 May, London Metropolitan Archives