oh, how much sadness is here... i do feel for all of you, it's horrible to build your hopes up so much and then - nothing. i hope you are in a mood to read a poem, because i have one. it's by a man called Donald Davie, and it's called "Barnsley & District". i hope it goes some way to comfort everybody who's feeling low. Judy Sugden! Judy, I made you caper With rage when I said that the British Fascist Sheet your father sold was a jolly good paper And you had agreed and I said, Yes, it holds Vinegar, and everyone laughed and imagined The feel of the fish and chips warm in its folds. That was at Hood Green. Under our feet there shone The modest view, its slagheaps amethyst In distance and white walls the sunshine flashed on. If your father's friends had succeeded, or if I Had canvassed harder for the Peace Pledge Union, A world of difference might have leapt to the eye In a scene like this which shows in fact no change. That must have been the summer of '39. Yet I go back sometimes, and find nothing strange - Short circuiting of politics engages The Grammar School masters still. Their bright sixthformers sport Nuclear Disarmament badges. And though at Stainborough no bird's-nesting boy Nor trespasser from the town in a sunday suit Nor father twirling a stick can now enjoy Meeting old Captain Wentworth, in his grey And ancient tweeds, gun under arm, keen-eyed And unemployable, and get a gruff Good-day, His rhododendrons and his laurel hedge And tussocked acres are not more unkempt Now that the Hall is a Teachers' Training College. The parish primary school where a mistress once Had every little Dissenter stand on the bench With hands on head, to make him out a dunce; Blank backs of flourmills, wafer-rusted railings Where I ran and ran from colliers' boys in jerseys, Wearing a blouse to show my finer feelings - These still stand. And Bethel and Zion Baptist, Sootblack on pavements where the miners' spittle Starred flattened kerb and greasy flag, persist. George Arliss was on at the Star, and Janet Gaynor Billed at the Alhambra, but the warmth Was no more real then, nor the manners plainer. And politics has no landscape. The Silesian Seam crops out in prospects felt as deeply As any of these, with as much or as little reason. also, my thoughts are with the band (so what's new?), especially our dear isobel. hope she gets better soon. much love, abi x +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list please mail "sinister@majordomo.net". To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to "majordomo@majordomo.net". For list archives and searching, list rules, FAQ, poor jokes etc, see http://www.majordomo.net/sinister +---+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" +---+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+