The Angry Exile: Another date for your diary.

The Hangman

Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"
The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all
For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.
For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.

Maurice Ogden

Thursday, 15 October 2009

Another date for your diary.

According to Pen Hadow there'll be no ice in the Arctic in a decade.

"To all intents and purposes the Arctic will be ice free in a decade. I do find the implications of this happening in my lifetime quite shocking."

Okay, so according to Pen Hadow, and giving him a few months leeway, the whole place will be fucked by the New Year 2020. Goodoh, not because I want it fucked but because I like greenies to make nice hard predictions that we can hold them to later on. So let's see where Hadow's prediction fits in with others like it:

"Imminently" - loss of world's coral reefs - David Attenborough ('world’s tropical reefs face ‘imminent destruction’ unless CO2 levels are slashed')
Late 2013 - ice free Arctic - Al Gore (North Pole will be ice free in five years')
Dec 2016 - the whole world and everything all fucked up beyond repair - the Prince of Wails and the 100 months* mob
Late 2019 - ice free Arctic - Pen Hadow (see above)
Late 2029 - loss of Great Barrier Reef - marine scientist Charlie Veron ('global warming will destroy the World Heritage site within just 20 years')

So there you have it - according to the consensus, which my dictionary says means a general agreement, the science ('settled' remember') predicts disaster in 4 years/20 years/7 years/kinda now-ish/10 years. And I have friends, relations and colleagues still asking why I don't take it seriously. How the fuck am I supposed to take it seriously? Not only has the so-called consensus on this settled science failed to predict the period of cooling over the last decade or so, or adequately explain why it happened or agree on how long it will last, but some of the consensus can't agree.....

Sorry but my oxymoron alarm has just gone off loudly enough to make

me temporarily deaf, the cats hide upstairs and the dog shit itself.

..... some of the consensus can't agree on what disaster is to befall us and when. Settled science my arse - even if you take it seriously you only have to keep notes on what's being said to see that in reality they don't know. It's also worth mentioning that the weight I give to Pen Hadow's prediction in particular is reduced by the fact that he couldn't get to the North pole earlier this year because of all the fucking ice.

More hard predictions will be added as and when I come across 'em and greenies are crazy enough to make 'em.

* It's occurred to me for the first time that it may be a typo and these guys actually think that the world will be saved by 100 moths. Presumably they're giant supermoths who will flutter around the sun and block some of the energy reaching our poor scorched planet. Or something. I'm not sure it's much crazier to be honest.

UPDATE: Watts Up With That has ten reasons not to trust the data produced by the Caitlin Ice Survey led by Pen Hadow.