Slough

[Guest]

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.

 

But spare the bald young clerks who add

The profits of the stinking cad;

It's not their fault that they are mad,

They've tasted Hell.

 

It's not their fault they do not know

The birdsong from the radio,

It's not their fault they often go

To Maidenhead

 

And talk of sport and makes of cars

In various bogus-Tudor bars

And daren't look up and see the stars

But belch instead.

 

In labour-saving homes, with care

Their wives frizz out peroxide hair

And dry it in synthetic air

And paint their nails.

 

Come, friendly bombs and fall on Slough

To get it ready for the plough.

The cabbages are coming now;

The earth exhales.

[BFR]

You have to love that poem. Mind you, had he been to visit Gravesend he'd probably have assumed the place had been bombed to bits already

[Stu M]

Quote:

BFR said:
You have to love that poem. Mind you, had he been to visit Gravesend he'd probably have assumed the place had been bombed to bits already

No, no, that's Northfleet. The Nazis dropped some kind of latent germ bomb on Gravesend, which has produced the current crop of genetic throwbacks that now populate the town centre.

[Harry J Allstars]

Ah you mean "Chav Bombs"?

[Stu M]

Indeed, Harry, although I think the Germans called them Schweinbomben.

[Number 8]

Aaaah, straight out of 'The Office'. David Brent read it out in the episode when Gareth copped off with a married bint and her husband at the nightclub... Remember?? Or am I the only saddo that watched it?... Answers on a credit card.!

[Slartibartfast]

It's a top poem, unfortunately if Betjeman was alive today he would probably apply it equally to most of the south-east.

[Bernard]

Yeah, you're right. Then Brent says: "And they made him a Knight of the Realm? Overrated"

[Number 8]

You goddit..! Tick-tock old boy..!

[Guest]

I am a registered user, but couldn't be arsed to go through all the nonsense when I realised I was about to reply but hadn't logged on.

 

Somebody at work quoted this poem to me when I told them we were due to be playing Sludge on Sludge this weekend.

 

Reminded me that I'd definitely read somewhere that JB did castigate Gravesend town centre for the appalling 60s vandalism (Woolies, Cheesemans>Army & Navy>Whateverit'scallednow) which some knobhead allowed to be built in the midst of some really quite striking buildings (ever looked up above the King's Head & the shop adjacent to it?) However, I think these views were expressed in an interview rather than in a poem, so in that respect Slough have the advantage.

 

Won't last long though. 3/4 down the Ryman & tipped for a draw by the prediction moron in the NLP? Give us a break. I think the bookies have a clearer view of things.

[Hempstead Gaz]

Before the Roman came to Maidstone or out to Sheppey strode,

The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.

A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire,

And after him the parson ran, the sexton and the squire;

A merry road, a mazy road, and such as we did tread

The night we went to Villa Park by way of Beachy Head.

 

I knew no harm of Kinnear and plenty of the Squire,

And for to fight the Frenchman I did not much desire;

But I did bash their baggonets because they came arrayed

To straighten out the crooked road an English drunkard made,

Where you and I went down the lane with ale-mugs in our hands,

The night we went to Gillingham by way of Goodwin Sands.

 

His sins they were forgiven him; or why do flowers run

Behind him; and the hedges all strengthening in the sun?

The wild thing went from left to right and knew not which was which,

But the wild rose was above him when they found him in the ditch.

God pardon us, nor harden us; we did not see so clear

The night we went to Birmingham by way of Margate Pier.

 

My friends, we will not go again or ape an ancient rage,

Or stretch the folly of our youth to be the shame of age,

But walk with clearer eyes and ears this path that wandereth,

And see undrugged in evening light the decent inn of death;

For there is good news yet to hear and fine things to be seen,

Before we go to Stonebridge Road by way of Shears Green.

 

With apologies to GK Chesterton. <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

[Martin]

We all love that poem round our way. Hard to imagine it has got worse since he wrote it.....