How is possible for the person who had the world at his feet,

the beckoning call of history call out with a flourish and fanfare

each time he raised his eyebrows and gave an opinion,

to fall so blindly, stupidly and recklessly low?

 

The flourished fanfare, now fading and sounding as if being delivered

by a midwife who has taken the job on,

not from duty or responsibility

but because she couldn’t get a job as a stripper or a walk on extra

in fashion shoot, her hands dirty, unsanitary and with the twisting

wriggling, dirt munching, hunger driven worm

underneath her fingernail getting fat, bulbous

and starting to stink of ignorance and idolatry,

is on the verge of self extinction and the trumpet

once brightly polished and handled with so much care,

is thrown with uncaring attitude into the back of the rusting car.

 

You had it all on a plate but somehow you lost sight

of it, you pawned it against your own stock,

never realising that Wall Street was fiction

and that your paper value was never much in demand,

now at its core I fear, worth less and worthless.

 

I have already held an olive branch, in fact the whole tree

and with fresh soil in which plant an entire orchard,

but in time honoured tradition,

the gardener has thrown down his tools because the trumpeter

hanging by the rope and by the strawberry patch,

sounds off key and isn’t sticking to the hymn sheet.

 

Never underestimate what has befallen you,

the clay feet, the golden dawn,

the addition of an orchestra at the last minute might redeem your song

but the trumpet’s solo piece will forever

be critically destroyed.

 

Ian D. Hall 2015.