Interview with Betjeman wrapped in a blanket in a bath chair rather old.
Have you any regrets, Sir John?
Pause for thought then
"Not enough sex"
L
On 22 January 2015 at 15:46, Max Richards <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> On Jan 22, 2015, at 9:22 PM, Bill Wootton <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> > Find the poem, Herr Pat or re-write it. What a hoot!
> >
> > Bill
> >
> >
> >> On 22 Jan 2015, at 8:08 pm, Patrick McManus <
> [log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >>
> >> Enjoyed this warm tale oops nearly wrote tail -and to think that I was
> a top
> >> speller at school -(long long since)
> >> I lost my grandmother early on was devastated for years-I remember but
> >> probable can't fine a WW2 poem about us together-where the aircraft I
> was
> >> cheering on were actually German and I got hauled back into our air-raid
> >> shelter! Cheers P
> Slough
>
> Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough!
> It isn't fit for humans now,
> There isn't grass to graze a cow.
> Swarm over, Death!
> Come, bombs and blow to smithereens
> Those air -conditioned, bright canteens,
> Tinned fruit, tinned meat, tinned milk, tinned beans,
> Tinned minds, tinned breath.
>
> Mess up the mess they call a town-
> A house for ninety-seven down
> And once a week a half a crown
> For twenty years.
>
> And get that man with double chin
> Who'll always cheat and always win,
> Who washes his repulsive skin
> In women's tears:
>
> And smash his desk of polished oak
> And smash his hands so used to stroke
> And stop his boring dirty joke
> And make him yell.
>
> Slough
>
> by John Betjeman (1906 - 1984)
>
> John Betjeman published his poem about Slough in 1937 in the collected
> works Continual Dew. Slough was becoming increasingly industrial and some
> housing conditions were very cramped. In willing the destruction of Slough,
> Betjeman urges the bombs to pick out the vulgar profiteers but to spare the
> bald young clerks. He really was very fond of his fellow human beings.
> Slough is much improved nowadays and he might be pleasantly surprised by a
> stroll there.
>
> http://www-cdr.stanford.edu/intuition/Slough.html
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