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As I take five minutes to scribble this blog down and piece something coherent together, it looks as though a piece of my work is going viral. For the second time.
Last time round, it was the letter to Caffè Nero, written when I discovered that they were making millions in profit while paying next to nothing in corporate tax. You can read about that here if you want to know more about what happened.
This time, two years on, it’s a poem.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve watched the Westminster soap-opera – the endless labyrinthine machinations and skulduggery and resignations and recriminations – with a sense of increasing disbelief. I wanted to say something about it. But how on earth do you find a way to write a poem about the car-crash of betrayal and ambition in which some of our representatives seem to specialise??
Lewis Carroll provided the answer. 150 years ago he wrote a wonderful nonsense poem, which included the words ‘slithy toves’ in the first line. What a gift for a 21st century poet on a small furious island on the edge of Europe. If ever we needed Jabberwocky, if ever it had something pertinent to say about the nonsense politics of Westminster village, the time is now, I thought. So last weekend I sat down with a pad, a pen, and an overheated imagination, and had a stab at re-writing it. ‘toves’ became ‘Gove’ and Stabberjocky was the result. Seeing as it’s currently been shared nearly 1000 times on social media, it would seem that it struck a chord with others, too.
You can read Stabberjocky on this website, here. And on Facebook, here.
If you enjoy it, and you want to share it with your friends, please do. The genius in this work is Carroll’s. Weak points are mine alone.
