Another Nod...

Pulling the ice axe from my leg
I staggered on
Spindrift stinging my remaining eye

I finally managed to reach the station
Only to find that the bus replacement service had broken down

After wondering to myself whether or not it should actually be called a train replacement service
I walked out onto the concourse and noticed the giant screen seemed to have been tampered with
Probably by a junior employee
Disgruntled commuters were being regaled with some dismal TVM
Involving a tug-of-love-custody-battle
Stockard Channing held sway

Down in the High Street somebody careered out of Boots without due care or attention
I suggest that they learn some pedestrian etiquette
i.e sidle out of the store gingerly
Embrace the margin

Fat kids with sausage rolls
Poor sods conducting polls

There’s a man with a mullet going mad with a mallet in Millets

I try to put everything into perspective
Set it against the scale of human suffering
And I thought of the Mugabe government
And the children of the Calcutta railways

This works for a while
But then I encounter Primark FM
Overhead a rainbow appears
In black and white

...

I got a letter from Stringy Bob:
“Still on suicide watch
Screws not happy
Spotted a Marsh Fritillary during Association
Was roundly ignored

What news you?”

I felt sorry for him
He’d only been locked up for public nuisance offences
One of which saw him beach combing the Dee Estuary
Found a dead wading bird
Took it home, parcelled it up, and sent it off to the rubber-faced irritant Phil Cool
With a note inside which read: “Is this your Sanderling?”

Another time saw him answering an advert in the music press
“Keyboard player required: Doors, Floyd, etc.
Must be committed, no time wasters”
You can guess the rest

I’d always imagined he would simply wander off some day into the hills
To be found months later
His carcass stripped by homeless dogs
His exposed skull a perch for the quartering crow

I folded away the letter and put it in my inside pocket
All of a sudden I felt brushed by the wings of something dark
May the Lord have mercy on Stringy Bob

Shite Day
I do believe it’s National Shite Day
It all points to National Shite Day
Someone’s declared it National Shite Day

Shite Day
My birthday! On National Shite Day
No bog roll, it’s National Shite Day
Cue drum roll, it’s National Shite Day

I find it a shame that such wonderful lyrics get wrapped up and hidden in a song with such a shite title (pun intended).

You can argue that most of HMHB's lyrics are casual and throw away and many are, but for what ever reason, I have always found the ones above inspiring and beautiful.

May the Lord have mercy on Stringy Bob