Categories
Poetry Rants

Who Will have Lost, Who Will Have Won?

Who Will have Lost, Who Will Have Won?

In just two days time, it will have been done
But who will have lost, and who will have won?
Will the many be starting their time in the sun?
Or will the few be preparing to ‘get brexit done’? 

The hope that I feel, thinking ’bout what could be
Gets crushed when I hear people talk on TV
The misplaced belief in the liars they see
Leaves a wave of despair hanging dark over me

Strong and stable, get brexit done
Meaningless platitudes each and every one
Shouted from redtops and broadsheets as one
Then chucked down our throats just to see if they run

For the many, not the few, actually means something here
A burning desire that so many hold dear
A genuine commitment that we must make clear
That real change could happen starting here from next year 

And just for the record, to the leavers at heart
Who trust that the Tories will deliver their part
No deal in a year is where they plan to start
As they tear the core of our economy apart

For years there was arguably little to choose
As the parties would try to wear each others shoes
There seemed to be nothing to separate their views
So you couldn’t establish just whose view was whose

They’re all the bloody same – is still a familiar sound
But this time the difference is there to be found
What each party stands for, however unsound
Is clearly displayed and discussed in the round

Even the hardest core blues ‘mongst my friends
Can’t vote for this lot – they see where it ends
But many must think that it still makes some sense
As the polls suggest it’s still paying dividends

If you think Corbyn’s not been a great leader of the opposition 
Then take time to look at the result of his mission
A tory like Johnson, by his own admission
Promising mass public investment against all tradition

That shows how the debate changed since Corbyn came along
This would never have happened were he not so strong
They’re terrified that he’ll show just how they’ve been wrong
And we’ll wonder just how they got away with it for so long

Each morning that we ponder the latest scare story
Means another day won by the lies of the tories
Avoiding policy discussion with another furore
To avoid the scrutiny getting too gory

It shouldn’t be tricky, they’ve been in for nine years
So all we should do is look back as the dust clears
Not look at the fantasies that suddenly appear
At election time when they’re concerned for their careers

The Tory economic rulebook lies abandoned in tatters
Their corporation tax plans are just mad as hatters
Their previous economic supporters have scattered
You can’t try to tell me that none of that matters

Answer this question that has no good answer!
So we can portray you as some kind of chancer
So our negative campaign can continue to advance a
Position that yours is a dishonorable stance. A.

Not answering a question, where there’s no right answer to give
Might be annoying – but count to ten – we’ll all live
But blatantly lying in the hope you’ll outlive
Your own words is something that I can’t forgive

That’s a false equivalence – It’s not the same thing
One is part of the game, the other damages everything
Yet Johnson lies and lies as if on a whim
And I can’t begin to describe just how much I hate him

I honestly believe that they are not all the fucking same
For the Tories have acted without any shame
They’ve lied and disparaged again and again
And again and again and again and again

Johnson says whatever he hopes will make the questions stop
I would not leave my kids with him, would sooner call the cops
Corbyn is a principled man, I’ll fight for him till I drop
I’d trust him with the password to my rusty old laptop

Yet he’s pilloried like some kind of racist cretin
Accusations I can’t understand, as I’ve met him
A lifelong campaigner who’s risked life and limb
Should not be subjected to this on a whim

English deference to inherited wealth is bizarre
And our misplaced trust in the printed press goes too far
Allowing scoundrels to parade like they’re some sort of star
While the rest of us look on in horror from afar

Maybe it’s needed and brings people to their senses
We let them get off after fiddling their expenses
So maybe this time it will breach their defenses
But if people vote for the liar, I can’t see where the sense is

Spin used to win, as did bending the truth
But lying’s taken over, and it’s positively uncouth
It’s there clear as day, leaving no need to sleuth
As we’re deluged each day with a wave of untruths

Labour will raise corporation tax to Europe’s high
That’s not spin.  It’s not bending the truth. It’s a lie.
It’s repeated knowingly, by a PM who thinks rules don’t apply
And by a media who know it is a lie and comply

It’s not a small lie.  It’s not inconsequential at all
Were it true it could carry significant threat to us all
But it’s not true.  It’s a lie.  And I’m genuinely appalled.
That we still trust these people and  remain in their thrall.

They won’t privatise the NHS – they respond every day
But they keep on privatising it anyway
And they’re on record saying they’re happy for it to decay
And yet we still fucking trust them and believe what they say

Promising the earth if we’ll fall for their lies
But without any plan to deliver our prize
It’s clearly a view of a sky full of pies
So power from their greedy cold hands we must prise

It’s been said that we get the media we deserve
Though that seems a bit harsh and it hits quite a nerve
As I found myself having to sit and observe
As I watched them supporting the elite they subserve

We get the politicians we deserve just the same
And they take us to war after war in our name
And the very suggesting of changing the game
Is considered a crime of which we should feel ashamed

108 months and they’ve bankrupted us more
The debt has been tripled and we’re left on the floor
Their claims of economic competence left raw
And we should all be questioning just what are they for?

This is not coincidence, this is not an accident
This is a conspiracy led by people hellbent
On protecting their privilege from so much as a dent
Or increasing their outlay by as much as a cent

Our system has been struggling for year after year
But it survived because rules were stretched but adhered
Well that’s gone.  And all it took was for one politician here
To unashamedly lie and disparage and smear.

Show me where Corbyn has lied.  Show me. Do.
He would have such an easier life if he were to.
If he just said yes even if it’s untrue
Staid of ‘I condemn all acts of violence on all sides’, however true.

He says what we should all say, instead of what we would say
But we don’t.  We just say yes and hope it goes away.
But he doesn’t – he takes what he considers the right pathway
Because to do otherwise wouldn’t be honest and that’s just not his way

I don’t want to deify him, because he’s just a man
And a flawed man at that, even though I’m a fan
But if you consider what has been hurled at him since all this began
I am so very proud that despite all, he still stands

It’s been called a personality cult, which is crazy
Because he’s barely got one – journalism – lazy
It’s precisely the opposite – he’s not there for his qualities
He’s lauded from the rooftops because of the policies

I’ll let you in on a secret – he’s not even that left wing.
The actual left of the party think he’s got much further to swing
We’ve just moved so far to the right as a country-thing
That nationalising utilities sounds like communisming

There’s nothing in this manifesto of labours
That would be out of place in most of our neighbours
Yet it’s presented as something from Mao’s little red book
By our scaremongering media right wing handbook

‘If [insert name here] was the leader, they’d win hands down’ 
You’re missing the point and you sound like a clown
Because if [insert name here] was the leader of this crazy playground
They wouldn’t have the same policies, and it’s them that’s the crown

He’s civil to the sort of people who we’d resist
He shares speaking platforms with those we’d prefer didn’t exist 
Believing dialogue’s the foundation and that shouldn’t be missed
Yet for that he’s routinely and roundly dismissed

I have neither the right nor the desire to question other’s experience
But I’m entitled to challenge the conclusions drawn hence
However well meaning and however intense
When they fly in the face of all other evidence

I’ve checked the manifesto and there’s nothing to see
Where it says ‘except for the jews’ and believe you me
If you were being persecuted you’d be standing with me
And right on your other side, you’d find dear JC

It’s a weapon that’s being used to maximum effect
The keep the threat of socialism in check
To portray my party as some lunatic sect
In the hope that our dreams for the many are wrecked

A compliant media, allowing itself to be used
To retain their court access, abuses excused
With no consideration for who they’ve abused
And feigning dismay when they stand there accused

Taking as gospel the lies from the right
Who rely on their willingness to share any bite
Hiding behind ‘sources’ who stay out of sight
Creating an atmosphere degraded by fright

Antisemitism is less of a problem in Labour than in society
But that’s not a story – it lacks notoriety
It doesn’t stop policy discussions – no hints of  impropriety 
And it doesn’t raises our pules and our levels of anxiety

The choice before us all is between two men my dears
One standing for everything that he’s stood for for years
The other is simply telling you what he thinks you want to hear
I know which way my vote will go (I guess that’s clear!)

I don’t think Johnson’s expecting to win as supposed
He’s expecting to be leading a coalition composed
Of the tories, the lib dems and others undisclosed
Which means he can ignore everything he’s proposed

The suggestion that a person who acts in one way ten thousand times or more
But if you look hard enough, and find an example or two in the store
That could be interpreted as being – something more
Then that becomes the truth and we’re suddenly at war

While some may be sincere in their feelings of pain
Most are just bandwagon jumping again
And looked at in context, it’s clearly insane
I call shenanigans – Again and again and again

If true, he’s the best undercover agent there’s ever been
Every thing he’s said and done makes him look clean
His past flies in the face of the accusations we’ve seen
And the manner in which they’ve been hurled is obscene

You can see it in his eyes – a look of sheer disbelief
That he’s getting away with it – you can sense his relief
Every lie that doesn’t cause uproar or grief
Emboldens him more and he lies through his teeth

The biggest problem?  This is the chance.  The one.
If we don’t seize this now, our chance will have gone
Everyone who said things can’t be differently done
Will be proved right and the voices of fear will have won

In just two days time, it will have been done
But who will have lost, and who will have won?
I’m seriously thinking that it could be fun
So let’s get out the vote and let’s ‘get Johnson done’? 

(c) Michael Gurner – 10th December 2019

Categories
Poetry Rants

I Can’t Offer You Any Advice

12:53 on a warm Tuesday lunchtime
Tripping down memory lane
In Bletchley Topdiner, Sister and I
Slurping ice cream floats once again

Allowing the taste to awaken our memories
Thinking of childhood affairs
And that’s when the phone rings, the bank want to talk
Which is odd, as we’re on our way there

‘Ah yes!’ I proclaim, with a warm friendly tone
‘We’re due in to see you at one’
Which I added was only seven short minutes away
So I asked if something had gone wrong

I wondered why you wanted an executors account
Asked the voice on the end of the phone
Your bereavement team told me I ought to
Is there something that I should have known?

I’m not at all sure why you’d want one you see
So I wanted to ask just in case

But we’re due in to see you in six minutes time
Can we possibly discuss face to face?

The phone voice agrees that that would be ok
And I hang up and pay for our food
Unaware of the trials that will fill our next hours
As we struggle to maintain our moods.

A few minutes walk and we’re there at the branch
We’re here to see ‘name withheld’
She smiled and came over and ushered us in
As my spidey senses failed to be quelled 

I’ve not ever done one of these, she opines
And I’m really not sure why you would
And not for the first time and not for the last
We explain that they told us we should

Why don’t you just want a current account
What would be wrong about that?

And we’re clutching at straws as to what we should choose
And it’s starting to smell like a rat

You won’t get a card or a cheque book you see
With an executors account

So how would we get money out once it’s in?
‘I don’t know’ left us shrouded in doubt

Would we be better with a current account?
A reasonable question I’d say
I’m sorry but I can’t offer you any advice
You’ll have to choose your own way

I don’t know anything about them you see
But your bereavement team certainly do
And they’ve said that’s what we should get for ourselves
So that’s what we’re expecting to do

I’m going to turn on a voice recorder now
She said with obvious pride
So we’ve got a record of whatever we say
In a way that can’t be denied

So you want an executors account? She said next
Without a cheque book or card
We don’t know what we want any more
We weren’t expecting it to be this hard

What’s the difference between the two accounts
And why should we choose either one?
Well I’m afraid I can’t offer you advice you see
So you’re on your own on that one

Just hold it there, I don’t want your advice
But I do want some info, I shout
You’ve told me the account I was told that I need
Can’t be used to take anything out

Why do you want an executors account?
She asked again with brow raised
Because your bereavement team advised us to
As I began to feel even more dazed

I’ve never done one of these accounts before
Though I’ve been here since 92
So I wanted to know why you wouldn’t just want
A current account that’s easy to do

The thought that her not understanding it 
Might not be reason for us to change
Did not seem for even an instant
To seem to her a little strange

We have some cheques in his name which we’d like to pay in
Could we do that with either account?
Though they’re not really all that important 
As they’re only for tiny amounts

Well if you’ve got cheques in his name then I can tell you you’ll need
An executors account you can use 
But we’re not sure what the implications are now
So we’re not yet ready to choose

They’re just for a tiny amount, we repeat
So we’ll happily go either way
What’s the differences between the two accounts
I can’t offer you any advice I’m afraid 

My colleague has done lots of these before
Although she finishes at one
She has, but you haven’t, I enquire with a sigh
As the time is now 1:21

The colleague appears, and I feel some relief
As she instantly takes full control
An executors account is the right way to go
And we’re finally on some sort of roll

Name withheld reads out leaflets and websites aloud 
And shouts out to claim with some glee
You can have a chequebook with an executors account
So you can get your money out – see

I still don’t see why you’d have an executors account
She offers once more without thought
As she clearly knows nothing of what it entails
Her advice wouldn’t ever be sought

The next stage is odd, an understatement at best 
Going through motions at will
None of which serves any purpose at all
But we’re going to go through each step still. 

Signing me up for a current account
Reading out terms and agreeing
For the debit card, overdraft and internet banking
That we’ve established that I won’t be seeing

Then cancelling all of those bits they’ve just added
And adding my Sister too
Reading out terms and agreeing again
Even though we knew none of it was true

Then finally converting to an executors account
More terms and agreements again
But finally having completed the setup
I found a sense of relief from the pain 

If there’s anything else we can do, let us know
Name withheld asks, with no irony shown
And I bite on my lip to avoid being rude
And stifle an audible groan

I still don’t understand why you’d have an executors account
Name withheld said as we walked by
Well I’ve now got an executors account
Although I still don’t really understand why

I’m making light of it now and all of the frustrations it bought
Grateful that some time has passed
Were things more recent and raw since his death
Someone would maybe have been glassed

When they wonder why they don’t do many of these
My answer is easy to believe 
They clearly just send them to dear name withheld
And she frustrates them until they just leave.  

(c) Michael Gurner – July 2019

Categories
Poetry Rants

8th October 2019

We didn’t win two world wars to be pushed around by a kraut? 
I’ve tried and tried to understand but I can’t work it out
Leave.eu?  Shame on you. 
Brexit party
Shame on you too
If you think maybe that’s just not nice?
Just google fucking Richard Tice.
Founder of one, chair of the other
Supporting one is supporting the other 
You are allowing this to happen.  

Two world wars and one World Cup?
Spouted again today 
One World Cup? 
I almost don’t know what to say   
Since the heady days of Hurst’s hat trick 
We’ve reached zero finals 
The Germans?  Six.  
What sort of boast is that?

Boasting about a single victory
From fifty five years ago
Just shows how much they’ve achieved since
And how far we’ve still to go

But it’s quite a good example I guess
Of how we’ve ended up in all this mess
Stupid attachments to former so-called glories
Fed out daily to wannabe Tories

Trump over the pond and Johnson here
Lying seemingly without fear
And yet they continue to get support?
They lie and they lie and they lie and they lie
Yet still in the polls they fly and fly

Make no mistake
We know how this ends
Blaming the ‘other’ 
Will hurt us all in the end

Watching the rise of the Nazis on telly
Seeing the jostling for power
Challenging status quo’s, laws and principles 
Dismantling structures hour by hour
Their names lost to history
Their games in the embers
Just paving the ways
For the names that we remember 

If you ramp up emotions against the other
You win
In the short term
But we all lose in the long term

When they get their way 
And things don’t improve 
Who gets the blame then
And how long before it’s you

Every line crossed, no longer surprised
No shamed resignations, no guilt in their eyes
But what makes me fear for the future my dears
Is I don’t have a clue where the fuck we go from here  

And hiding somewhere just out of sight
Is the unspoken fear at the rise of the right
That there aren’t any limits to what they’ll explore
And that soon we’re in Syria fighting Johnson’s new war
Flying the flag and killing for fun
Democracy lost behind the barrel of a gun
If that still seems unlikely, I’d say with regret,
You’re not really paying attention just yet

(c) Michael Gurner – October 2019

Categories
Poetry Rants

Look At That You Bastards!


I don’t want to sound mean or bitter
Come across like I’m holding a grudge
But those things are all true
So if I sound like I do
Please forgive me, and try not to judge

To the teachers at Denbigh who taught me
And threw up their arms in despair
Some things would be best
Were they off of my chest
So bear with me, and pull up a chair

I’ve spent most of my life, taking all of the blame
On young shoulders, now burdened with age
But I’m scratching my head
That maybe I’m misled
That my guilt could perhaps be assuaged

I know I was not a good pupil
And I’m sure I made your lives quite hard
A difficult child
Would be putting it mild
So I doubt I was the only one scarred

Why can’t you be more like your sister
She never caused us this grief
And I couldn’t explain
Which I found quite a shame
As I’d have probably felt some relief

But I was just a fucked up little boy
And you were the one’s so mature
For years you’d been trained
So I’d like to complain
‘Bout the beatings I had to endure

Agreed – I made stupid decisions
And that can’t have been easy to fix
But I’d have to oppose
The response that you chose
To repeatedly hit me with sticks

Hit me with slippers, trainers and canes
Again and again and again.
And then hit me some more
And then hit me some more
Expecting good things from the pain

I’m supposed to give you some leeway
That we lived then in different times
That I should let go
As you just didn’t know
And that I should leave all this behind

‘Never did me any harm’ is the line
That you hear with defiance and a twitch
Well it may not be yew tree
But those bastards hit me
Abuse or assault, not sure which.

‘Just act your age’ was the cry that I heard
In between those so regular shoe-ings
Which turned out to be tough
Ironically enough
As it turns out that’s what I was doing

If you ever delve into the science
Staged development of parts of the brain
The prefrontal cortex
And it’s calming effects
Makes my beatings seem quite inhumane

The part of the brain that says ‘let’s not do that’
Doesn’t work ‘right’ till you’re out of your teens
I couldn’t explain
Why I’d screwed up again
So to beat me seems a trifle obscene

Perhaps I was beyond any hope or redemption
That no motivation could have ever assisted
Or then and again
Something other than pain
Might have helped had you only persisted

I don’t understand how your mindset
Decided that that was the route
‘Just hit him some more
His performance will soar’
Your persistence at least I’d salute

Hope against hope to be sent to the head
Each time a beating was due
At least when he caned
He seemed genuinely pained
But the one who enjoyed it was you

Dunlop green flash – size eleven
I can see it and feel it today
Me bent over in front
You sadistic cunt
As you gleefully swung it away

Used to inflict as much pain as you could
They’d never been worn – didn’t fit
I knew at the time
That you wore a size nine
The elevens were bought specially – you shit.

While the welts and the weals faded slowly away
The shame and embarrassment remained
I just calmly observed
It was what I deserved
And that learning just wasn’t my game

Oddly enough, your motivation techniques
Didn’t transform my approach to my lessons
Felt I was no good
Left as soon as I could
And the impact it had never lessened

I’ve always been pretty successful in work
Positions of power – responsible roles
Never been unemployed
Had a career I’ve enjoyed
Fulfilled many professional goals.

I’d always thought I was quite clever
That I just couldn’t do it their way
But as I got older
That chip on my shoulder
Started gnawing and gnawing away

So I started to study, in my thirties, part time
And oddly enough, it was tough
But quite amazingly
I got me a degree
Leaving me feeling stupidly chuffed

So could I possibly go one stage farther?
Could I build even more in my plans?
Last weekend in Ely
Will live with me dearly
As I walked cross the stage and shook hands

So all that is left is for me to just hope that
You’re ashamed – you sadistic bastards
No thanks to you
With your canes and tennis shoes
Now I’ve gone and got me a masters.

(c) Michael Gurner June 2019


%d bloggers like this: