Why, oh why Does Friar Fry Regard himself as I & I ? My questing question grew and grew, As fruitlessly I’d try and try To fathom out that guily guy. I chewed that puzzle through-and-through For where the answers likely lie – He knew, of course, I knew he knew, But still he let my brooding brew, While smirking on some higher high The way those holy dudes will do While letting we poor students stew. His glance was always slightly sly, As if to say “I’m using you ! I may yet further crew accrue – Am I not worth my duet due ?” And so, dejected, by-the-by, I looked him in the eye and eye And bid he share his news anew – “Oh Friar Fry, pray wise me why You see the world as mine & my ?” He looked me back and sighed a sigh And said “You know what’s truly true ? We each and all are two-by-two – Both I & I, and you & you.”
I woke that morning, I recall, Surprised somewhat I woke at all – And out my window, plain to see, My street was smoky-ruins-free. In fact, so fine a morning shone, My coat I had no call to don – The larks still sang, the doves still perched, And nowhere sulphur rained, nor zombies lurched.
I walked on through that wrathless dawn, Alive ! Alive and springing ! I gaped for lack of demon-spawn, Alive ! Alive and swinging ! I fed the ducks, I named the clouds, I mingled with bewildered crowds – We wore no coats, we wore no shrouds, Alive ! Alive and singing ! Our lives would never be the same, That day that Jesus never came.
I gawped that morning, hollered out, Surprised I had the breath to shout I danced with gnats, I waltzed with trees, I hugged the rain and kissed the breeze. I cried with strangers, wept with folk, I stuttered ev’ry word I spoke – I didn’t care, I couldn’t mind, I thanked the Lord that I was left behind.
I ran on through that wretchless day, Alive ! Alive and wheeling ! I laughed for lack of human prey, Alive ! Alive and reeling ! I leapt, I skipped or simply stood, I didn’t care for ought or should – I sang and sang because I could, Alive ! Alive and feeling ! Our lives were ours ! There was no shame, That day that Jesus never came.
So when you turn to pray in the facing-Mecca way Do you use the Great Circles or the Rhumbs ? Though both have got it wrong – for the route that’s shortest-long Shall be plumbing through the mantel as she comes.
Saint George & The Dragon by the Salviati Workshop, Woolwich Garrison church
For England & St George
Up in Heaven-on-the-Clouds You works on our behalf, Pushing through the saintly crowds To bat for Halifax and Bath, And bring to Lynn and Dale of Borrow Sun today and jam tomorrow.
Working hard in Upper Eden, Pushing England’s cause. You wouldn’t get the saint of Sweden Cheering on so many wars. Rule Britannia, Hope & Glory – Welcome to the national story.
Tea and crumpets, trains and cricket, Stratford to South Shields. There you lurk, on moor and thicket, Anglicising foreign fields. Who needs Alban, Bede or Swithun ? Give us Bowie, Dench and Niven !
But wait, I hear the Genoese Have hired your service too – And Catalans, and Portuguese, And Greek and Germans join the queue – The Georgian and the Muscovite Are proud to sport your red and white.
And soldiers, archers, and the Scouts, Equestrians and knights, And farmers rearing sheep and sprouts Are likewise firmly in your sights. I do hope, George, with all this lot That England’s voice won’t be forgot.
And then there’s leprosy and plague, And syphilis to boot, But here your role is rather vague On how you earn your extra loot – Helping patients come to terms ? Or do you represent the germs ?
And back home in your country seat, Its lord is rarely seen – In ancient times, your sandalled feet Came nowhere near our mountains green. But hey, who cares from where you’ve strayed – For Englishmen aren’t born, but made.
You spend your days in Greater Blighty, Meeting with the Boss – Asking him to make us mighty, From Land’s End to Gerrard’s Cross You always done us proud, our George, When lobbying for Cheddar Gorge.
“And, behold…the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.”
– Matthew 27:51-53
And the very earth shook beneath us, And the sky came dark and the veil of the temple was rent – As the Son at last came to leave us, So the tombs where slept the saints were breached as He went. And there they sat, arisen yet still, Since so long dead, they patiently waited For a night and a day and a night until On Sunday morn, they arrived belated. Zombies on the loose, they come ! Zombies in Jerusalum !
And yet not a word was spoken, As He was interred by Joseph of Arimathea, Of other tombs that were broken – For surely he witnessed the quaking’s rough aftermath here ? For there they sat, arisen yet still, Awaiting the one who had yet to be buried – So lay Him within the sepulchre’s chill And roll up the stone, his soul long ferried. Zombies yet procrastinate, Zombies lurk and zombies wait.
And lo, not a word was spoken By the Marys on Sunday making their way to His tomb, As they passed all the saints newly woken, As another earth-tremor gave sanction to auto-exhume. No more they sat – unprisoned, unstill – Now great was their stagg’ring and groaning as any – As stumbling and jerking, they lurched down the hill To Jerusalem, to the marvel of many. Zombies, rotten of complexion ! Zombies join the Resurrection !
And never a word was spoken By the Twelve at the Pentecost, just a few weeks on, With their tongue-gabbling voices choken – Yet never to ask where now had the dead all gone ? Where now they sat ? Or risen they still ? Where went their mission, so silent of news ? What is the purpose they mean to fulfil ? Is this what is meant by Wandering Jews ? Zombies, born again through Christ ! Zombies, torn from Paradise !
And still not a word is spoken, And the puzzling verse is never read out in church. No statue or stained-glass token Celebrate animate saints as they stumble and lurch. And those who are sat in the pews quite still And pretend that the verse is a metaphor or test – I guess they haven’t the need or the will To admit to themselves that it might be a jest. Zombies, clinging to their mask, Zombies, too afraid to ask.
Jesus ? My word ! Oh my lord, it’s the boss… Well, I never expected to see you today – Except maybe just hanging out up on your cross… Yet it’s funny, but when as a kid we would pray, And the Reverend Thomas instructed our eyes To be scrupe’lessly be tight and respectfully shut, Still I’d sneak them half-open and squint at your thighs, Half-expecting you’d come down a moment and strut. When there’s no-one to see, would you take-up the chance To relax and to stretch, and to smoke, and to dance ?- Till the words of the prayer were quite lost to my trance. Yet you never showed even the hint you’re alive, So you hung just the same when we sipped on your blood, And you looked down as glum when we learned of the Flood, And you seemed as remote when our prayer-books would thud, And we mumbled or massacred Hymn Forty-Five.
But anyway, never mind my reminiscence, Just how long’s it been since you came round my way ? For somehow you faded in slow evanescence, Your black and white certainties merging to grey. And old Reverend Thomas was no help explaining The problem of evil or problem of gays, And so finally, even my lifelong ingraining Could not keep the wonder or stem the malaise. But reading the papers, there’s plenty of good news – From leprosy vaccines to movies and blues, And there’s juries, and voting, and self-tapping screws – When abandoned, alone, we learned how to be great. I had waited and waited back there in your church For some word or some action to come from your perch, But unheard was my questions, and unseen my search – Until now, when I find you, I find you too late.
As a kid, I had a Bible, But I only read the bits I knew. Yet in the front, it listed all The endless books therein, and quite a few ! I read the titles, wondering, What ancient tales they must contain – Though most were called by random names, Which sounded boring, sounded vain.
But one stood out – The Book of Numbers ! Was it all divine geometry ?, Secret cyphers ?, Sacred fractals ?, Heaven’s holy trigonometry ? Did it declare why the speed of light Is the very speed it is ?, Or how the cosmos banged so bright ?, Or how the atoms whizz ?, Or how entangled is the quark ?, Or why is so much matter dark ?, Or are the anti-particles still His ?
I should have known – Nothing but a census, a way of keeping score. When asked for facts, the Lord has shown That nothing matters more than tax and war.
Not that taxes in themselves are a bad thing, as I’ve mused on here and here.
There’s some who look on history As pages waiting to be filled, They seize the day and shake it hard Until all wild oats are tilled.
And some of us view history As what was going on besides, While we were busy being born, Or catching up with last year’s tides.
There’s those who sit in judgement, And there’s those who have to dust the throne – There’s some whose names are chiselled down, And some who have to work the stone.
And so it goes, and so it went, And history will keep the score – There’s those who fill the greatest tomes, And those who sell them door-to-door.
If God is all-knowing, That means he must know Of all that there ever was, All that there ever is: How the quarks come And the particles go – Ev’rything, ev’rywhere, All truth is his.
The past and the present Are known by the Knower In all their minutia, Quintessence and trait. But still there is somewhere Where knowledge is slower – It drips out in trickles, And God must just wait.
Almighty all-knowing Is shrouded in mist When it’s scrying for knowledge Where no god can be. For all of the Future, Has yet to exist – So it cannot be known When there’s nothing to see.
More knowedge is locked up That knowedge he knows, He’s learned but a fraction Of all there can be. He knows that it’s out there, And waits till it shows As slowly – so slowly ! – It works itself free.
Riding down Redemption Freeway, Hair and beard flying free, I swear I saw the Magic Man Astride a Liberty. A Saviour on a V-Twin, In the Chapter of the Gods – Where demons are the rockers, And the angels are the mods. Like Icarus’s Goldwing, Or the Banshee’s throaty roar, Or that bat right out of Ragnarok: The Thunderbolt of Thor. I swear I saw the Sunday Rider Revving past the weekday suits While tearing up Salvation Street In goggles, gloves and boots.
Rhyming Couplets 