If you see Sid

Forty years on 
from me, me, me
and where are we?
If you see Sid tell him
we sold each other out
down a blackened river
toxic with self-doubt,
the family silver too.
Steel sheds rust rotten,
swinging in the wind,
car factories a sepia memory
we only run out
on rare free Sundays.
Dirty coal dusts our memories
as we cough, try to look angelic,
with shipfulls of the stuff
still sailing up our rivers,
bought from abroad for a song
while pitmen’s grandchildren
scrub and scrub 
but can’t remove the soot 
of a starving black economy
ever since the North was harried.
The dark masters of ‘Care’
abuse the word ‘Trust’,
our careworker kids rushing
between peanuts-pay tasks.
Someone switch off the lights,
we can’t afford the bills
of the vultures circling above
our burning fields and hills,
who all bear the look
of some Uriah Heap,
beckoning from the nightmares
of our darkest psychosis.
And all the while in our silos,
windows battened against the other,
we snipe and compare,
jabbing at the unguarded,
stabbing under their armour.
The Scots want out
and who can blame them,
yearning for the return
of the Roman wall.
The Welsh are walking too,
Glyndŵr’s shadow
guiding them all.
Leaving England alone
to rage against the world,
pitchforks at the ready,
tattered flag unfurled.
A nation of Mainwearings
without the man’s care,
wild-eyed, seeing deadly foes
and threats everywhere.
So if you see Sid do tell him
his mistress’ lies worked a treat,
little Canutes guarding our beaches,
rocks tied around our feet.

Harry Gallagher

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