Beneath the Waves – Garden of Buried Hopes by Nightblue-Art
The Bootymen’s Air
There is, it’s said, a pirate ship That haunts the Caribbean. Or does she sail the Orient, Or pilot the Aegean ? Was ever there a stranger craft On which men went to sea on ?
No-one seems to know her name, For all she rides the swell. Some say she’s The Banshee, Some The Siren, some The Belle, Perhaps there’s plenty meet with her, But none who live to tell.
Yet one fact all agree on, Is you hear her when she nears, By a slow and lonely singing That the ozone brings our ears – And a world away from the racket Of the usual pirate jeers.
They claim that it’s her figurehead Who keens upon the waves – That is, it is the ship herself And not her crew of knaves, As she bares down on the helpless souls And sings them to their graves.
But eerier yet, her voice, they say, Will echo off the sea, And bounce upon the clouds and back While the breeze blows in her key, She sounds from all directions, And in perfect harmony.
So if you ever catch a snatch Of ghostly murmurings, And if your hold is full of coin And fingers full of rings – Then pray it’s just the whistling wind, And not the ship who sings.
Sometimes, falls the Burns Night on the number two New Moon, That will open the cacoon of a brand New Year – So the neeps and cock-a-leekie get to share the serving spoon As the beansprouts and the riceballs soon appear. From the docks of old Kowloon to the mists of Brigadoon, So it all goes in the haggis, and the bamboo pipes the tune – As we all sup down together, from New Scotland Yard to Scone, In a typhoon of lampoons and tartan cheer. Now maybe I am nothing but a Sassenach poltroon, From the billabongs of Perth, and through the snows of Saskatoon – But a shortbread in my green tea on a global afternoon, And the paddy-fields of glens are very near.
Can I just say what a wonderfully weird experience it is to hear someone read Address to the Haggis in an unapologetically RP accent ?
Through the village of Longbourn, the undead shuffle, The unemployed and the destitutes. The Luddites who moan in a rustic muffle, Back from Napoleon without any boots. Mr Bennett says he can’t even hear them, So alien is his world to theirs, But they’re getting restless, threatening mayhem – What if it spreads to the staff downstairs ? Don’t worry, Lizzie, here’s bold Mr Darcy With wealth that’s been stripped from the backs of the poor, He knows how to whip should the rabble gets arsey, And put them back down when they dare ask for more. Crush all their groups, and deport the whole crew, This seething horde of the unwashed masses. Best wipe them all out like befell Peterloo – Or the balls overrun with these jumped-up lasses.
When not ignoring the cruelty of the upper classes, Jane Austen liked to describe them at leisure over here.
Jenny von Westphalen & Jenny Lind (both born Johanna). Presumably their J’s were soft.
Next-Jen
Women have answered to ‘Jenny’ far longer than ‘Jennifer’, Whether they’re maidens or maids – A pet form of Janet, Joanna, or even of wrens, She’s really a jack-of-all-trades. Old English had a few Jinifers, sure, But those weren’t Guiniveres, those were Junipers – Then, from nowhere, Jennifer came – From Cornwall, and from a parallel universe.
As the Twentieth Century progressed, The Jennies were pressed into service And switched their allegiance to Jennifer only, And rode her success to over-abundance – Then into the downward curve of redundancy, No longer heroines, neighbours, or queens – But surely we’ll always remember the Jennies, As donkeys, or greenteeth, or spinning machines.
I’ve discussed the unexpected rise of Jennifer over here.
The Impressionists, they started it – The deliberate eschewing of the details of the waterlilies, Slapping on the sunflowers, slacking and half-arsing it, The barmaid blurred by beer-goggles, shorn of intimates and frillies. The Modernists just loved the concept, Loved the new permissiveness to never bother with the hard parts, Far too busy writing manifestos, or just overslept, To ever stoop to spend the years to learn the graft behind the arts. Ah, I guess they have their fans, these Abstract-ists of vapour – And not just money-launderers or the Commie-fighting CIA – Some might look alright in advertising, or as wallpaper, When tossed-off in an afternoon of dribbles, nudes, and squelching clay. But then, the public never get to choose who shall be fruitful, Because we must take whichever trends the critics shall annoint. It’s just…I want my art as something rare and something beautiful, And not a random find, or shocking ugly, just to make a point.
Little wasp, little wasp, Laying eggs upon the tree – Sting the one who would be king, And sting him once again for me. Little worm, little worm, Wriggling in your swollen gall – Bite the one who’s cowering, And bite him twice for one and all.
But oh !, you’ve gone and birthed a hornet, Let loose on us worker bees – And king or queen, or brutal drone, They sting the same – just ask the trees ! To rid us of a coronet Will always leave behind a gall. The buttocks mould to fit the throne – The canker ripens, warts and all.
Reparations ? What, today ? Two hundred years too late ? And how to choose who has to pay ? Best think it through now, mate… White men ran the slave trade, true, And I’m a man and also white – But don’t charge me for grievance due, I played no part in the blight. While others wreaked this tragedy, It’s not me, mate, and not my folks – I come from village farmhands, see, From ordinary blokes. While others banked the whole affair, Or clapped the chain or cracked the whip, We never owned a single share, Nor crewed a single ship. So don’t try laying on the guilt For crimes my bloodline never did – The damnable at which you tilt Were not my fam’ly, kid. I bear no blemish on my name, I bear no once-and-future sin – Don’t think that you can judge my blame By the colour of my skin. It’s not me mate, and not my genes, My hands are clean, my soul is light – So spare your wrath for dukes and queens, Not me, mate – get it right ! You may claim Britain was kept afloat By ev’ry Caribbean crop – Yet my folks never even had the vote To make it stop. My ancestors were starved and bruised, And sometimes even outright killed – They all were wage-slaves, much abused By the lords whose lands they tilled. It wasn’t as bad, of course, as chattel, But still bloody bad, in its way. But yours were worse – you’ve won the battle – Is that what you want me to say ? Alright, I’ll say it – cos I get it, I do – But they’re not you and they’re not me. So even if my blood were blue, My soul would still bloom free – For the faults of our great-great-grands back when Have died with them, and passed away – Look, nobody alive back then Is still alive today. For none of us in here’s a slaver, No-one’s whitewashing the trade – So please, just do us all a favour, And find a new crusade. Is there still inequality ? For sure – not race, but class. We need to target poverty, Not grievances of the past. Inherited wealth ? Old foundations ? Tax the rich, then, to redress – And give the reparations To the schools and the NHS. But your way feels like liberal creds To buy-off the guilt and pain – For giving a payout is putting a price on their heads All over again.
Rhyming Couplets 