There was a scent of snot filled contempt

in her young squeaky voice,

the type that grated against the ears

and made the natural defence

of wax crumble in alarm,

erect, proud and sniggering

“I don’t care”,

she squealed

with a high pitched whine,

“who they are, I don’t listen to anything

that was made before I was born,

it is immaterial to me,

you’re all weird really, why can’t you listen

to something now and hip?”

With that she snapped her fingers

a couple of times as if making some

ludicrous statement sound important,

stately, imagine Churchill doing the same,

or Clement Atlee, “I don’t care who that

boss of Germany is fellah, he is so

sick, a right moose”, a flick of the fingers

and half an inch of pipe tobacco

all over the Commons floor later,

the leader of His Majesty’s loyal

Opposition stands up and crows,

“Sick dat la.”

If the action of whizzing fingers wasn’t enough,

the painful thought of not giving

a monkey’s doo-dah about anything

before you were born seemed

unbelievably stupid, crass and self important

boredom; no Shakespeare, no World Cup in 66

in which to bring into every argument

during each passing group stage

disaster, no Moon landings, no Elvis,

no Beatles, although I still get to hear

George Harrison, no John and Bobby and Martin

Luther King to look up to, no Hancock,

no James, no pictures of my mum and dad

in black and white, of learning

of the stupidity of war in the trenches,

of the Farthing and the Florin

and the mini skirt,

none of these would be relevant, would mean

a damn;

I am so glad that the immaterial girl

who looked down her nose

as Jeff Lynne came on stage

that night at the Echo, was no daughter

of mine,

how easily she would forget me.

 

Ian D. Hall 2016