Alas, I have been unable to uncover the artist of this work.
Ev’ry Winner gets a Free Shave
(In reply to Herblock)
To ev’ry newly elected member, Let me spruce you up for the Chamber ! To all of you who stood against The very things I’m fighting for, To all the new MPs who dream Of showing immigrants the door, To all the laws to squeeze the poor, And all the shills of gutter press, To all the friends of oil and banks, And those who got us in this mess, To all the demagogues of wars: For all of that, this day is yours.
So step right up ! Come one, come all ! Majorities both great and small ! You sir ! The new-crownded minister ! I see the campaign’s left its mark – You’re looking rather sinister With pallor grey and stubble dark. I’ll take a razor to your chin And even-out your crooked grin, And give no cause for dread As I draw my blade across your throat, Of a single fleck of red – For my razor, sir, is not my vote. So even if you’re not my choice, You’re still my fellow voters’ voice, When tallied, said and done. So go on, sport your freshened face And show us how to run the place – This shave’s on me, old son ! But just the one…
There’s some who say voting is pointless But who always register on the rolls And proudly walk to the place of polls To add their protest to the tolls. They take their voting paper And refuse to make their mark, (On principal – it’s not some caper or lark) Then post their unblemished slip in the box To highlight the lack of a Goldilocks, Considering the election invalid – An empty ballot cast for an empty ballot, With candidates all just the same – And whoever gets in, well, they’re not to blame. And if what they say is silence, Then still, it has to be said At least they got off of their arses and got out of bed. They think our nation’s fate, with dread, Is in the hands of oiks and youths – And like those pencils in the booths, Is hanging by a thread.
Ah, to be young in the lands of the free – With the whole of your glorious future before you, And giving no thought what that future may be. Ah, to be young when the whole world adores you, With no need to pay us a thought in return. Enjoy your sweet apathy, ere you must learn.
Ah, to be only a shrug and a sigh, To be ever-unsullied of needing to know. You’re glad to be asked, yet you give no reply, As our ministers come and our generals go. Your life is for dreaming and dancing and drifting, And never mind queuing and choosing and sifting.
Ah, to be young on a planet so old, With its taxes and statutes and loopholes and blame, Where fraud is rewarded with knighthoods and gold, And where ev’ryone grumbles and goes on the same. Ah, to be young and to not give a damn For the stumps of the candidates promising jam.
Oh, to be agèd and cautious and wise, In a compromised world with a weather-worn hope – We’re hypocrites, surely, and all you despise, As you wash off our greys with your black-and-white soap. Ah, to be young in these battles we’re waging – You never get jaded by never engaging.
A lobby card from the 1947 Hollywood adaptation of An Ideal Husband, artist unknown.
An Ideal Crony
Sir Robert Chiltern, Bart – A plummy, chummy, bleeding heart, Who made some loot insider trading – Suddenly his star is fading When extorted by a high-class tart.
What ho !, his chums in high-up places Shall protect him from disgraces – Don’t let on, don’t make a fuss, For don’t you know he’s one of us ? So stiffen up the lips on both his faces.
So what, a sacred trust was sold ? We’d do the same for thirty gold ! So call the playwrite with the sharp wit, Sweep it all beneath the carpet – No need that the voting oiks be told…
Impressionist painters in poverty On canvasses lacking in threads, Glamorous silent-screen starlets, And bereted and bearded reds, Scientists seeking-out secrets, And dare-devils pushing their luck – They died too soon and died too young, When fortunes came unstuck. In days before the drugs did for, Disease was the way to go – Consumption, of course – or else it’s the pox – Or the needs of the narrative flow. Heroines, gothic or chivalrous, In novels antique or sublime – They’re dying too young from the loin or the lung, Yet they’re dying precisely on time.
Rock and roll, all voters ! Staunch and floaters, poor and wealthy – To the fuss-and-tussle hustings jamboree ! Bring the kids and bring the dogs, Let’s throng with hacks from press and blogs To jeer the speeches, snap the selfies, Make them promise jam for tea – Then talk with wonks and rebel Scots, And mix with toffs and flat-capped Trots. Let’s join the jostle and bus the bustle, And get on down to the hustings hustle.
But it’s never like that these days. Our candidates are scrambled through A mesh of endless screens, That changes all the red to blue And filters out the golds and greens Till all that’s left are greys. They rarely need to meet the public, Rarely let us have our say – There’s just too many unelected journos in the way !
No wonder disillusionment is growing – But no ! That’s what they want of us ! We mustn’t be intimidated by the charging battle-bus. Don’t be ashamed of floating or don’t-knowing, Thoughtful contemplation never was a crime – Just make sure that you make it to the booth on time ! For I don’t care who gets your vote, As long as someone gets your vote – Be they protest, status quo, or loony-fringers. Don’t buy their apathetic spin, Or else we let the cynics win – A can’t-be-arsed electorate of impotents and whingers.
For ours is the power, ours the law, My fellow voters ! We aren’t just humble peasants stood in awe Before our lords – We’re citizens – not subjects, Nor statistics, blips or quotas – We’re individual voters, And not meek amorphous hordes. We’re millions of voices making millions of choices, With our pencils mightier than any swords.
So roll up, you voters ! Shake a leg ! It’s time to give a damn ! With me ! Let’s make the bloody buggers beg – Let’s rock this hustings jamboree !
I make the sun rise. I control fate. To me the credit for all that is great. Know that my worth is a thousand of you, And yet I descended to share what I knew. This world I remade in my image agleam, From antediluvian law and regime – And now ev’ry crisis since my rise to rule, Is legacy still of that tenancy cruel. But I have delivered unto you, my flock, For I’m your All-Knowing, Infallible rock. And I have the Power, the Knowledge, the Plan Of fiscal and social beyond wit of man. Yet do not presume to inquiry my ways, Don’t ponder my motives, don’t question who pays. Just pray for my blessing, and so bring to pass A life for the better in safe Middle-Class.
But they…they…
They make it rainy. They bring you down. They are the Demons who covet my crown. For their ev’ry plan is most evil and wicked – They take all your hopes and your dreams and they stick it And quash your beliefs as they freight them with dread, Then charm you to dream of their visions instead. They promise you ev’rything better their way At just half the price that you currently pay. And, yes, it is true, how their glamours beguile, With pretty predictions and invectious bile – They smear my almighty with heretic slander, With scandal and intrigue and base propaganda. But since I am perfect, we must remain strong – They cannot be right, for I cannot be wrong. For I am your god, your elected divine – It’s never my fault when the sun doesn’t shine.
Charon Carries Souls across the River Styx by Alexander Litovchenko
The Charon Line
We lined-up on the shore, All so silently and patient, As we waited for the ferryman to come. The river was so calm, And the air so deathly still, And the souls were so sepulchral and so glum.
The sky above was black, With no moon or stars upon it, And yet light there was, from unseen candle wicks. The ripples barely washed On the river we all knew we knew: Some say the Acheron, and some the Styx.
The sand beneath our sandals Was a ghostly grey, and barren, And was bunched up by the groynes that strutted out. No birds were seen there wading, And no crabs were on the scuttle, And no barnacles or sedges, flies or trout.
Yet offering a focus Was a short and ancient jetty – Like a road to nowhere but the endless sea. And here it was we waited, With no sense of how long waiting, For we hadn’t any other place to be.
Then through the unseen nothing Came the faintest splash and motion, As a distant dory drifted into view – And standing at its stern Was the sternest man left standing, As he worked his ten-foot ore into the blue.
With a slow and practices action Of his stroke, recover, stroke, So his rust-red ferry glided to the shore With not a punt too many, He was docked upon the jetty, As he paintered-up and shoulder-slung his oar.
Bearded and burly With the bearing of a bull, Looking old as both the river and the boat. A loincloth and a cloak Were his only grubby garments, With his chest and thighs as hairy as a goat.
He stood upon the planks And he held his other hand out, Which we knew was for the taking of the fare. We reached into our mouths, And we felt beneath our tongues, And withdrew the coin deposited in there.
Some could find no obol And they feared they should be stranded, And they clutched their worried forehead in dismay But lo !, they found two pennies Had been placed upon their eyelids And they sighed with some relief that they could pay.
The boatman took the money Which he dropped into a leather pouch – He never looked, but fingers felt the coins – He knew which ones weren’t obols, And he tossed them in the river, And their owners likewise shoved against the groynes.
In life, we might have wondered Where he ever got to spend it – But now that was no concern of ours at all. Instead, we simply paid him In our final ever payment, And were left withouot a bead in wherewithal.
Those who proffered pennies Earned a scowl and muttered whinges On tradition, change, and numpties who know best. But rules are rules, and tolls are tolls – He pocketed the coppers both, Then waved them on his barge just like the rest.
He only took a dozen, As we sat on barest boards, While he stood upon the till and plumbed his oar. And those who couldn’t pay him Were the stranded on the strand, Who must wander through the wasteland evermore.
And what was waiting for us On that other, distant, shrouded bank ? We never tell, and you shall never know – At least, until the day you die And make the trip yourself – Unless, of course, you’ve somewhere else to go ?
View of a Hustings in Covent Garden by James Gillray
The Hustings Shuffle
Promises promised, but not to be kept – They know it, we know it, and they know we know – But it must be this way – it is what we expect.
Their promises come and their promises go – We want to believe but we try to resist, And say to ourselves that it’s only a show.
Their policies spin and their arguments twist – We’re warned of the dangers their rivals equate – Then hands must be shaken and babies be kissed.
We try to engage and we try to debate, And try to remember it’s us who’s the boss, Just looking for servants to tend to the state.
They beam out the smiles that they sharpen with floss, They pose for our photos and laugh at our jokes, And feel for our anger and pity our loss.
They tell us and tell us they’re average folks From average backgrounds with average smarts, Who love to get down with us ordin’ry blokes.
Beware their seductions, their flattering arts That promise the world if our trust they may borrow – We give up our votes and they crush our green hearts.
They leave us defiled and they show us no sorrow, They love us today and they jilt us tomorrow.
They seem to be lasting for longer each year, So long past September and into December – For even in frost and in sleet, they appear – Still shining in bloom on the thermal frontier.
And I have seen violets outlast their season, And snowdrops and hellebores turning up early doors. I wonder if climate change offers a reason ?, For something is urging these flowers and trees on.
The branches are bare, but the apples still mellow – We’ve bred them so hardy, it just makes them tardy. Surprises of colour make strange bedding-fellows, With the roses still red as the crocus bursts yellow.
I’ve always found the habit of naming flowers after the saints on whose feast day they bloom to be a shaky tradition in Europe, when one considers our pot-luck temperate maritime climate. Will there be an overnight host of golden St John’s wort on the 24th of June every year ? With our climate, the closest you can come is within a month. And of course, Easter brings its own complications.
Rhyming Couplets 