Angels in the ceiling, salvation in the needles, Organ practice in the air, the bishop looking proud – Gone is the busyness of canons, deans, and beadles, But the locked-up church can once again give welcome to the crowd. Monks used to pray here, monks who ministered the sick – But these days it is nurses who are rolling up the sleeves. So what would Jesus say at their death-defying trick ?, Their communion, regardless what each congregant believes. Would he drive them out, back to their lab’ratories ? Or would he get stuck-in with his newfound clientelle ? Stained-glass in the windows, telling ancient stories – Maybe in a thousand years, they’ll tell this one as well.
Strictly speaking, there were no monks at Salisbury, but rather secular canons. These performed the same duties, but weren’t under a monastic rule, and lived in the town rather than in adjacent cells. Sort of like day-pupils rather than boarders.
Manners & Customs of ye Englyshe in 1849 by Richard Doyle
The Wages of Sin
Thanks, Dick Turpin – what a guy ! Killed a few, but by-the-by. Thank you Ripper, Jack the Flash – Take the tour and rake the cash. Thank you Crippen, bask in fame – Morse was made through your good name. Thank you Shipman, take my breath – Waxworks beckon, Doctor Death.
We’ve all heard of the sealed train That carried the 36 between Zürich and the Glasbahnhof, In April 1917. A couple of ferries and a new suit later, Tornio station, platform 1, To catch the sleeper to Petrograd – And become the prodigal son. Finnish metals all the way, On over the swamps and rugged terrain To the Finland Station and history, Though no-one thought to note the train. One is preserved – it may be the one, But as likely not – we’ll never know. Those locos were all faithful workers, Too busy toiling to stop and crow.
But in the height of August, Fleeing back the way he came – Working his passage with a shovel, Lenin stoked the movement’s flame. 293 – preserved in glass The only loco we know he rode, Not that we can blame the pistons For their unexpected load. American built, as the century turned, A proud ten-wheeler, H2-Class, A broad-gauge beauty, wood-fired boiler, Black, without that bourgeois brass. Does it matter ? Holy relics ? Lenin was also just a machine That public anger drove to the station In the red-heat of 1917.
I have completely failed to determin which platform at Tornio the train to Petrograd would have departed from, so naturally I chose the one that rhymed.
Cats crop up in poetry Like they do in neighbours’ kitchens, But when it’s time for serious, They’re nowhere near to pitch in. They haven’t time for heavy metaphor Or mopey musing – And earnest stream-of-consciousness Will send them straight to snoozing. But crack a smile and shake some wit, Or balladeer some derring-do, And lapping up the limericks, Here comes the kitty-crew: Pepperpot and Sootikin, The tyger tyger in the hat, Macavity and Pangur Ban, The owl-loving pussycat, In nurseries and nightclubs, In the scary and absurd, We’re sure to stumble over them Wherever words are purred.
Sometimes, we shall come to a junction We’re sure we’ve taken before – The fingerpost fulfils its function, But we need it to tell us more:
Did we pass this way in our youth, Rounding the bend to find the familiar ? Can we trust mem’ry to tell the truth When it says the way was hillier ?
I guess the world’s a globe, and feet are curved, And arcs are circles over time, And anyone who’s life has swerved Must one day find they’ve made a rhyme.
And so, this junction has crossed our path, And forced a choice of way – And still we live in the aftermath Of the road we took that day.
This time, let’s take the other of three, The road untook, the life unspent – Except, for all we try to see, We can’t recall which way we went…
Did the Romans ever make it over Antoninus ? Did their legions hike the Highlands, past the cirsium and pinus ? Did they meet his high-king highness, In his fiery hair and golden torc ? And did they think this seaside-caesar woaded-rogue or hawkish-ork ? So did the Fleet Agricolan heave-to in Scapa Flow ? The orcas and the auks go by, but they don’t know.
Scenes from the Chapter House at Salisbury Cathedral depicting Noah, circa HE 11284.
Be Fruitful, and Multiply
The rain comes down and the flood breaks free And ev’ryone dies, from Atlas to Russia In the year 2348 BC – Or so says Bishop Ussher. And after the waters dissipate Noah and sons and wives make eight.
The empty land is beckoning them – Europe to Japheth, Egypt to Ham – And Asia becomes the realm of Shem, From Turkey to Vietnam. So now that the land’s no longer wet, Just how many kin will they beget ?
Well see, the Bible clearly lists out Sixteen grandsons, twenty-seven greats – And these all boys (the girls are missed out), To found the known-world’s states. But such expansion cannot last long Till plague and war and famine are strong.
So let’s say from here, things settle down And nat’ral attrition soon appears, And the time it takes to double a town Is a hundred-and-fifty years – In Ussher’s time, with coal and machine, That’s the highest the world had ever seen.
So, taking his dating of when things happen And taking that girls are as common as boys, So fifty years later we’ll start our mapping And tease some facts from the noise – We’ve roughly a hundred, in all events, And spread across three continents.
A cent’ry post-flood, or so James willed it, The Tower of Babel raises its steeple – But only forty-odd folks can build it – That’s all of Asia’s people, Including elders and babes-in-arms, With no-one fishing or tending the farms.
Then Abraham hears God Almighty, Telling him that he is chosen Out of a pool of a hundred and ninety – And yet his wife is frozen… The Lord, though, promises a son To make it a hundred and ninety-one.
In time, when Jacob’s family go To Egypt – well, the dates allow For Asia to have five-twenty-or-so (Though down by seventy now.) See, that’s how exponentials grow – They end up big but they start off low.
Exodus – 1491, (A shorter sojourn than modern lights), As a third of the world is on the run – Fourteen-hundred Israelites. A count of six-hundred-thousand men ? I think you’d better check it agen.
For those of us who prefer our dates to be logical, 2348 BC is HE 7653, the Tower of Babel is pegged at 7754, Abraham’s calling at 8104, Jacob’s folks move to Egypt in 8295 , and the Exodus is in 8510. The reference to Asia being down by seventy is because Genesis 46:27 gives this as the total size of Jacob’s family to come and join him.
Say you want a revolution ? You wanna be a street-fighting man, Raging hard against the masterplan ? But violence is no solution – However much the Man is to blame, You’ll never beat him by killing in the name.
We won’t be televised On Sunday bloody Sunday, between the barricades, Or meeting with the new boss to lead the black parade. You wanna be mobilized By standing in the way of control As the Eton Rifles take their bloody toll ?
You wanna fight the power ? Then let the records turn turn turn – For we are the Antichrist to make ears burn. Cometh the finest hour, Then lock up the guns & ammo – it’s clear That we’ve gotta sing our way through here.
Fernando, can you hear the drums, Rocking the free world, rocking the casbah – Let’s sing for a year that we’re dreaming after, Until the reckoning comes – And the lost cause chord at last gives birth. To give peace a chance, for what it’s worth.
detail from Banquet of Cleopatra by Geovanni Tiepolo
Margarita Time
Cleopatra dropped a pearl in vinegar To win a bet, And watched her bead dissolve away to nothing Without one regret – Although in truth it must have fizzed a day or two Before it’s done And in that time she’d lost her land and lost her life And lost her son. And Rome, while once her lover, saw her lustre tarnish Bit by bit – For strip away her cultured beauty, And she’s just a speck of grit.
Rhyming Couplets 