FIDDLING WHILE ROME BURNS
The boy stood on the burning
deck
Surveying the watery scene,
And wondered why the water
Once so
clear, was now dark green.
'They can’t afford to clear
the weed,’
Said an angler on the bank;
‘The fish have gone,
and so have we,
The sport and our spirits just sank.’
The boy stood on the burning deck
Watching walkers swim by on the path;
‘It’s three feet deep
in mud’ said one,
‘We now take the dog for a bath’.
The boy stood on the burning deck
Wondering why it was quiet;
The pub on the canalside
Should have
been a riot.
‘Yes’, said the
landlord, ‘we used to be full
When there were boats to see;
But
the cut is so shallow the boats can’t get by
And neither, it seems,
can we.’
The boy stood on the burning
deck
In the centre of the town;
Its waterside flats had been much in
demand
But their prices were going down.
For nobody wanted to live in a
place
Which stank of renewed deprivation;
A little money saved here and
there
Wasted decades of regeneration.
‘Save me!’ he cried to
a passer by,
‘Please send a boat for help!’
‘They
can’t afford the rising fees’, she replied,
‘You’ll
have to help yourself.’ ‘
This place was a former
mill’, she said, ‘
A great historic wharf –
But when we
said “local heritage”
The government said “bugger
orf!”’
In any case, a boat’s no
use
The last one seen round here
Was burnt out by disaffected youth;
You must save yourself and jump clear!
The boy cried, ‘that I
cannot do!’
He said ‘I dare not leap!’
Came the answer,
‘I would if I were you,
It’s only six inches deep’;
‘For they can’t afford
to dredge it
And it’s all filled up with muck;
There’s barely
enough water
To float a tufted duck.’
The boy stepped off the burning
craft
And waded to the bank;
‘For this, he muttered, I gather we
have
The government to thank!’
‘Thinking themselves very
prudent and wise
They’ve wasted fifty years
Of private and public
enterprise
Of the sort that they normally cheer.’
‘This place with flat paths
for the world to use,
This linear park in the heart of the city;
This
place that brings millions of tourists to cruise
Is going up the spout.
What a pity.
So much for the environment
And all of the work we’ve been doing -
Those silly cuts in
government
Will let it go to ruin.
The boy looked at the burning
boat
And said, ‘we’ve a flag to raise!
Let’s shift our
feet and cast our vote
And save our waterways.’
THE CUT
We’re in favour of disabled
access
Said the man from the government office.
Well, there’s 2000
miles of flat paths out here,
And you lot are taking them off us.
We want to encourage the
wildlife, he cried
We invest in their habitat;
Well here are the
creatures, the birdlife and voles –
And you’ll soon put paid to
that.
We want city children to breathe
fresh air
To discourage a culture of vandals
Well, you already have
urban linear parks
We call them the canals.
We want to encourage a culture of
health
For the disadvantaged and poor;
Well, you have a great place to
run and to bike -
It runs outside your door.
We want to regenerate cities, he
said,
With a vibrant tourist trade;
Well, we brought in millions of
tourists and pounds
Till you launched your cost-cutting raid.
We want you to think that we
care, he said,
But we’d like you to keep your mouths shut;
Well we
won’t, we replied, and you’d better think twice.
This is our way
of life; it’s the Cut. |
