Trafalgar
They sent it first in ’47,
A thank you to the forces of good
That fought fascism
(Antifascist, antifa)
From ’39 to ’45,
That stood shoulder to shoulder
In the hour of Norwegian need.
Every year since then, it lights the capital
The Luftwaffe half-levelled
To remind us of that gratitude,
Ambassadors gathered to toast the cordiality
Of internationalist solidarity,
Where Nelson presides from his problematic perch
And lions guard this city’s heart.
Now it’s dark, like these days,
The branches thin as promises of fairness,
The once-thick spruce a sliver of itself,
The sprigs empty, like “Never Again”,
Its needles drooping downwards.
Is that still a star on top?
Through these bare boughs you can almost see
The refugees we’ve victimised
The minorities we’ve demonised,
The shadow on the continent
That we have helped legitimise.
While sitting Priti, the Home Secretary tries
To criminalise the RNLI’s attempts to help its fellow man.
Peace on Earth but not on water,
Goodwill to some but not to all.
Flags flown from road bridges shout
MAKE ENGLAND GREAT AGAIN,
The National Front took their time, but they won.
What must the world opine,
When even this once-verdant pine
Symbolises our decline
Into authoritarian, Tory-talitarian,
One Nation/White Nation clampdown.
And that fifties generation that had it all
Except for the personal nobility of war,
Who said they’d do it all again in a heartbeat?
We just didn’t realise which bit they meant.
Bloody hell. Another Door, another musing on Christmas Trees, only this time as a metaphor for fascism. The Poetry Advent Calendar 2021 has hit its groove early this year…
Today’s Door takes inspiration from the Trafalgar Square Christmas Tree, an annual gift from the people of Norway, in appreciation of the British efforts during World War II. It’s generated a lot of comment on Twitter (the tree, not this poem (yet (ha))) as this year’s donation is… without being ungrateful… A little threadbare? As Dan Rebellato pointed out, if the tree symbolises our fight against fascism, it’s no wonder this year’s is looking a bit ropey. To put it mildly.
That tweet was the inspiration I needed to bludgeon away at today’s poem, and although it’s neither as succinct nor as lacerating as I hoped, it at least wears its heart on its sleeve. It also doesn’t read as well as I wanted it to. I’m working two jobs at the moment, my lunch break is the time it takes me to walk from one to the other, and today that was largely spent on the phone, preparing for a meeting I had as soon as I got home. So it was written in the snatches of time I could find between all of this, typed onto my phone and then bridged together later; as such, it reads like several different chunks of potential stitched together into less than the sum of its parts. But it’s getting on and I’m getting hungry, so it will have to do.
Dan Rebellato is a playwright, and to my knowledge we’ve never met, but he was a lecturer at my old university, Royal Holloway, and taught several contemporaries of mine their Playwriting module in second year. Our paths never crossed as I was in the other Playwriting group, with the legend that was/is Mike Punter. It was back when I was still determined to be the new Nick Payne, harbouring dreams of getting plays on at the Royal Court and the National, and we’d spend Monday afternoons in Sutherland House discussing Woyzeck, the inadequacies of Michael Billington as a theatre critic, and the way to create conflict in drama (put them up a tree and throw more rocks!) Mike had a great quiff, turn-ups in his jeans, Doc Martens, and the most gentle, encouraging attitude to his class. I adored him, and one Christmas gave him the most awkward accidental hug: We shook hands, and his placed his other hand on my arm for emphasis; I misread the situation and threw my other arm around his shoulders. He was a bit taken aback but in hindsight, I regret nothing. If you read this, Mike, you’re utterly fantastic.
I do miss writing for theatre. I miss writing generally, really, as other than this Advent Calendar I’ve cobbled together very little throughout 2021. I started off with a grand vision to produce an epic play about King Canute. Maybe next year.
This nostalgic diversion has maybe distracted from the thrust of the poem itself, which is that what is happening in this country is terrifying, and the rest of the world seems to be either laughing at us, or going the same, horrifying way. I wish it could make me feel better that I tried my best to stop it, but frankly it just makes it feel worse.
Thanks to Dan Barker for the photo. And thanks to Norway, all the same. It’s a lovely country. Lovelier than this one at the moment, certainly, although that’s not too much of a compliment. At least however dark it gets there are people out there, fighting the good fight and spreading the kindness, some of them I’m sure still with quiffs, Doc Martens, and turn-ups in their jeans.
La lutte continue. Twenty-three days to go…
Owen x
The Poetry Advent Calendar 