The Angry Exile: I predict (not) a riot

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

Friday 30 September 2011

I predict (not) a riot

After what happened in Britain early last month it'll be interesting to see what happens in Sydney as a result of this.

Five police officers surround a car, a number of them with their weapons pointed at a man who was reportedly driving around Sydney streets armed with a gun yesterday.
Moments later, the gunman was dead. Police won't say whether officers or the man fired first - or whether the man fired at all - nor reveal how many shots were fired.
[...]
The drama unfolded on Castle St, Castle Hill, about 12.45pm after a 000 caller told police of a man armed with a gun driving on Showground Rd. Minutes later, the Toyota Hilux was spotted at the intersection of Pennant and Castle Sts, near the police station.
Plainclothed officers ran from the station, and Assistant Commissioner Denis Clifford said there was a confrontation with the driver and a number of shots were fired.
[...]
A handgun was removed from the vehicle and placed on the nearby median strip.

As Australian police are routinely armed and in most states are often equipped with tasers as well these sort of incidents are probably more common here. In fact Sydney police shot a guy in his own home only a couple of days ago, apparently as the result of a misunderstanding. And of course Sydney can riot as well as the next city, as the 2005 Cronulla riots showed. Still, despite the fact that so far it appears to share a few things in common with the Mark Duggan shooting in London (not in the race of the dead man because that's not been made public yet and he could be Mr Average White Guy for all we know right now, but just in that police quickly surrounded a car, shot an occupant and recovered a gun) I don't think the shops of Pitt Street Mall are going to need to rush out to buy window boarding before the first wave of looters hits because I don't think anything's going to happen.

And I can't really put my finger on why. I don't think it's because this does happen a bit more with armed cops about and that people are blase about it - in fact if you think about it in terms of incidents per X number of 'police hours armed' it's probably quite rare, and possibly rarer than in countries where the police are not all armed all the time (ironically the last coppers I saw before I left the UK were wandering around with MP5s and a semi-auto pistol each). Perhaps it's just that I don't get the same feeling of them and us with Australian police, or at least not to the same extent as in the UK.

That might not be at all representative of the thoughts of Aussies but it's the way I see it, so my feeling is that people will watch and wait and see what comes up as a result of the investigation. If it had happened in Britain right now I reckon people would already be pulling garden walls apart for the bricks.