I know a modern architect who really loves his jazz. The hypocrite ! Still clinging to his Monk and Duke and Chas ! The music of the moment is the only sort allowed – Hip-hop, pop, and drum & bass – played endlessly and loud. For any newly-written jazz is just a quaint pastiche, So councillors and plutocrats must keep it on a leash. Keep it stark and minimal, without such syncopation – For finely-crafted solos are just needless decoration. And as for old recordings – don’t restore them, but adapt: Saxophones now synthesized, and melodies now rapped. Drum machines inserted, so’s to tell the new from old – Gut ’em out and fit ’em up – it’s brutal, brash and bold ! We’ll wipe the records clean to make the space for noises new, For songs are just machines for lis’ning to.
The 6th of June is ev’rywhere, it seems, It turns up all the year. This av’rage day has gained the fate Of ev’rybody’s av’rage date. The 6th of June has crept into my dreams, The Swedes have whispered in my ear – Or maybe D-Day’s up to tricks ?, Or the Devil claimed oh-six-oh-six ?
I guess we each of us have such a day, For tripping-over, bric-a-brac finds – It pings our sonar, winks our eye, And scores us another proof, we cry ! So patternless-patterns will work their way Into the slots at the back our minds – We know they’re wrong, but still they fix, Just random rolls of double six.
We can always wish For your easy charm, And your good right arm, And your follow through. We can always wish To be just like you – And we always do, For it does no harm.
And who wouldn’t want To have fun like that, Or to run like that, Or to ride or to drive, Or arrive like that – And who wouldn’t want To excite like you, Or to fight like you, Or to think or to gaze, Or to blaze like you.
And who wouldn’t want to, Who wouldn’t want To be just like you And the dreams you flaunt ?
We can always wish For your matchless skill, For your carefree thrill, And your tried and true. We can always wish To be just like you – And we always do, Yet we never will.
For we shall never get To attract like that, Or to act like that, Or to play or to sing, Or to swing like that – And we shall never get To romance like you, Or to dance like you, Or to live or to dine, Or to shine like you.
And we never shall get to, We never shall get To be just like you, But we’re dreaming yet.
From Classical Comic’s translation of Macbeth, illustrated by Jon Haward.
The Bard & I
Ah Will, we were not meant for one another, For ours is not a marriage of the minds. What can I say, my literary brother ? We’re poets both, but very diff’rent kinds. So yours the fame and wealth and adulation, And mine the anonymity and debt – But then again, we glean our exhortation From very diff’rent mistresses, I bet ! For I could never write your verse, nor wish to – And you, I’m sure, could never capture mine. So you be Zeus, and I shall try for Vishnu – And keep my metre dry, and hold the line. And if some day I reach your heady skill – I’ll have the way – but always lack the will.
Concerning the left panel at the top, are we to believe that an exhausted and demoralised man-of-action such as the Seargeant (who is apparently suffering a head wound) would really speechify and wax lyrical ? To the point, man !
Fine scallops and oysters For townlands and cloisters, And cockles and mussels – alive, sirs, alive ! Come find one and pluck it From out of my bucket – It’s yours for a penny – or fourpence for five.
Fresh from the beaches of fair Dublin Bay, Fresh from the sands where they thrive, oh ! Fresh from the beaches, and fresh ev’ry day – Cockles and mussels alive, alive-oh !
There’s no need to scrimp it With whelk or with limpet – I’ll sell you no snails, sir – I’m clams through and through. Don’t ask me for sprinkles Of peries or winkles – Why settle for one shell, when you can have two !
Fresh from the wash of the fair Irish Sea, Plucked-out as soon they arrive, oh ! Fresh from the sand to the boat to the quay – Cockles and mussels alive, alive-oh !
There’s some who dig beaches For lugworms and leeches, But they make a slimy and wrigglesome catch. And scampi and crab, sir, Will scamper and jab, sir – But mine are like eggs that are waiting to hatch !
Fresh from where seagulls love combing the sand, Fresh from where cormorants dive, oh ! Fresh from Portmarnock and Dollymount Strand – Cockles and mussels alive, alive-oh !
So what do you say, sir, To venus or razor ? Just tease-out my beauties with jack-knife or steam. They may hold a pearl, sir, A feast for your girl, sir, You’ll soon warm her cockles with cockles in cream !
Fresh from the beaches of fair Dublin Bay, Fresh for your ladies and wives, oh ! Fresh-in from Skerries and Claremont and Bray – Cockles and mussels alive, alive-oh !
This isn’t about Molly Malone, but one of her fellow-hawkers. Though I do like to imagine Molly and Leo Bloom passing each other and stopping to share the craic.
Now When They Heard About the Resurrection, Some Began to Scoff
“The Church of England expects its attendance to continue its decline for the next thirty years.”
– The Sion Times
Here I stand, in my pulpit, Looking down on yawning sands of empty pews – And in the Sunday papers, The stats and graphs and surveys tell the news. Of course, we know the culprit, This modern life is secular and on-the-go. The Devil’s at his capers – And yet, he seems to lack the will to spread his woe. So year by year and prayer by prayer, The congregations slowly cease to care.
We’re mocked and feared and left behind – The faithful die, the faithless breed, the undecided shrug, And life goes on. Some are anxious, some are angry, some are smug, But most are happy, most are kind. Thirty years from now, then who will save their modern souls When we are gone ? But then, they will not need our help, according to the polls. Can I begrudge their proof and doubt, When Satan’s reign is peace and love throughout ?
The title come from Acts 17:32, slightly paraphrased from the various translations. Of course, the world isn’t quite ‘peace and love throughout’, but as both Harold Macmillan and Steven Pinker point out, we’ve never had it so good.
Born, bred and boarded in England, by chance, Yet close as to Calais as Canterb’ry town – Where the Channel keeps nibbling the chalky-white Downs, And keeps her from cycling to France. Trapped by La Manche From Dunkirk to Rennes – But still she stays staunch: La Douvresienne !
Douze ans is she, in the town of her birth, And watched by the Castle that keeps her kept here. But the bright lights of Calais are teasingly near – Yet somehow they’re out past the end of the earth. Trapped by the rosbifs Like Jeanne d’Arc back when – This unwilling hostage: La Douvresienne !
She lives by the gateway, she lives by the quay, And watches the French as they come off the ferries In Deux-Chevaux Citroëns and bob-cuts and berets, With bœuf bourguignon and bagettes bearing brie. She mimics their movement Agen and agen, With steady improvement: La Douvresienne !
When the weather is right and the signal is clear, She re-tunes her black-and-white into their station And watches in awe at the sights of a nation, And wishes she understood all she can hear. She mimics their voices, Both women and men. She makes the right noises: La Douvresienne !
But their language is tricky to lodge in her head All accents and commas and genders to test her, And sometimes it’s only a shrug or a gesture – It’s just like their spelling, there’s so much unsaid. She’s learning at school With the rest of Class 10. She’s sounding so cool Is La Douvressienne !
She fancies herself as a Mademoiselle, But family hist’ry declares her a Miss But what do they know of Gainsbourg or Matisse ? It’s more than genetics that makes her a belle. It’s more than a pose For this proud Madeleine: She’s no English Rose, But La Douvresienne !
Buddleia ! Buddleia ! Ev’rywhere, buddleia ! Growing in gardens too small to contain it. Growing in wasteland and making it muddier – Railways and quarries won’t even restrain it. And then in July, see it all turn to violet As thousands of flowers bring stamen and style. Soon, we think, soon comes each painted-up pilot To flitter and dazzle and make it worthwhile. But here in the suburbs, with bushes amassing, There’s plenty of purple, but no Blues in sight. Just when did we last see a butterfly passing, Aside from the clothes-moths and odd Cabbage White ? Here in the suburbs, these shrubs ramble well, Yet we won’t see a Camberwell Beauty near Peckham, Nor ravenous inchworms descending to wreck ’em ! So no Painted Lady, no Marbled and Tortoiseshell, Won’t see an Argus, a Skipper or Admiral. Monarchs and Emperors too have set sail, So where the Fritillary ? Wherefore the Swallowtale ? Coppers and Brimstones have melted away, Hairstreaks and Ringlets receded to grey, The Gatekeeper’s keyless, The Speckled Wood’s treeless – A banquet of nectar, yet still not a single gourmet. So where strut the Peacocks we avidly spy ? Comma and Map and Wall, Where do their larvae crawl ? Where do their mothers all gravidly fly ? Small Heath and Meadow Brown, Not to be seen in town – Naught but irruptions of davidii ! And soon it’s September, and blooming is ending, And then they’re just weeds that need far too much tending. Buddleia ! Buddleia ! Ev’rywhere, buddleia ! I tell you, the purple invasion is pending…
Rhyming Couplets 