The Angry Exile: There goes the neighbourhood

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

Monday 20 June 2011

There goes the neighbourhood

Oh, Christ, who let him in?

Click for link... if you honestly believe I'd make this shit up

Tony Blair, former British Prime Minister (1997-2007), makes his first speaking appearance in Australasia since leaving office, sharing his unique insights and experiences in leadership, negotiation and innovation.
[...]
Tony Blair, the politician who defines our times is one of the most engaging, respected and in demand speakers of his generation. In addition to his experience in office and his influence on world politics, Mr Blair continues to play a leadership role on issues such as faith and globalization, the Middle East peace process, Africa governance and climate change.

Hmmm. Maybe they're talking about a different Tony Blair. I was thinking of the one who handed not only the country's purse strings to a certifiably window-licking, phone-wrecking, spendthrift madman but also the job of PM when he eventually stepped down. The one who threw open Britain's borders to everyone and anyone who wanted in and taxed his own citizens in order give money to the newcomers, the trigger happy prick who simultaneously committed military personnel to various gunfights around the world - not all of which were easily justified without the assertion that someone had weapons they didn't really have that couldn't have reached Britain even if they did exist - while depriving them of the equipment they needed to do what was asked of them effectively. I was thinking of the motherfucker whose ego and hubris led him to describe this last as being the hand of history upon his shoulder. I was thinking of the hypocrite who said that his government would be "purer than pure" and would have "no truck with anything improper" before both allowing parliamentarians to use the expenses system to feed off the taxpayers' backs and indulging in a little nest feathering himself - exactly how much is a matter of speculation since the expense records for the Tony Blair I'm thinking of were inadvertently shredded.

But clearly the grinning mutation I'm thinking of is not the same as the one coming to speak in Melbourne because he... oh, wait. No, it must be the same one after all because tickets start at one thousand fucking dollars! And what do you get for your thousand bucks?

The evening will comprise of a sit down meal featuring an address by Tony Blair followed by a moderated question and answer session with the audience.

Moderated questions and answers, eh? There's a shock. I take that to mean that $1,000 doesn't get you the opportunity to wait politely for your turn to give the bastard a well deserved mouthful of abuse and that the only people speaking to his arseholiness will be those who've been carefully selected and screened beforehand. That just leaves the food, which for a grand a plate would have to be phenomenally good or served by Scarlett Johansson in the nude or both.*

Thanks all the same but I think I'll give it a miss. However, it'd be nice to know if the man's ghastly wife is in town that day too and what she'll be wearing. I wouldn't want to post something in her by accident.

* I suggest Scarlett Johansson partly because I know The Grim Reaper would like the idea and partly because the thought that a handful of people searching for "naked Scarlett Johanson" might come here and find me calling Tony Blair names instead gives me a little chuckle on an otherwise dreary winter morning.