02.17.04
Preaching web of peace to stop the tribal slaughter
Sometimes a voice emerges from the gloom of government to ring with the sharp clarity of a bell across the land. Sometimes a poetical voice calls ministers to account, the powerful to heel, the thoughtless to hang their heads in shame.
Paul Marsden MP, representing Shrewsbury & Acton, does not possess that voice.
Here is Mr Marsden’s cri de coeur on the Kelly affair, entitled “An English Inquisition“:
Gentle scientist inventing silent killers,
Through years of laboratory tinkering.
Protected source on wicked bugs,
Happy hours tending pink rose petals.Buffoon holds aloft this little mole,
Blinking in the row of bright lights.
He barely sees the quarrelling brutes,
Nervously wiping his white whiskers.Forced to walk the plank in parliament,
Distraught at demands for answers.
Political drama to cheap, sweaty hacks,
Torrent of black invective in the high court.Tortured game ends when the despair overwhelms,
An English gentleman bowing to torrid spectacle.
Family lose him to sound bite and paranoid PM,
As he takes a walk in the park by a river of red.
Chills the soul, doesn’t it?
Disturbingly, there’s more. Best stick to the political stuff, like this paean to William Ewart Gladstone, which starts off attempting a full rhyme of “Scouser” to “Lancaster” and never really recovers. Or Marsden’s rebel yell against the party line, which seeks to keep the whips at bay with a rearguard action of confused imagery:
Crossing the party line to protect the frontier
Land of hope painted in front of the home of the brave
Just, for God’s sake, stay away from the steamy stuff.