Working Class Hero

By John Lennon

As soon as you're born they make you feel small
By giving you no time instead of it all
'Till the pain is so big you feel nothing at all

A working class hero is something to be

They hurt you at home and they hit you at school
They hate you if you're clever and they despise a fool
'Till you're so fucking crazy you can't follow their rules

A working class hero is something to be

When they've tortured and scared you for twenty odd years
Then they expect you to pick a career
When you can't really function you're so full of fear

A working class hero is something to be

They keep you doped with religion and sex and TV
And you think you're so clever and classless and free
But you're still fucking peasants as far as I can see

A working class hero is something to be

There's room at the top they are telling you still
But first you must learn how to smile as you kill
If you want to be like the folks on the hill

A working class hero is something to be
If you want to be a hero then just follow me
.

(John is now available on iTunes, a true poet.
We miss you John and need you now more than ever.
GIVE PEACE A CHANCE! - Steven)

This Bridge

Sitting here upon this bridge
In the dead of night
The street lamp turns on
One minute in every five
And I am startled in each turn
For all the lessons I may have learned
From this
.

Are these words that appear to me to be hung
In the annals of human history
Wrung from the aspirations of
My ancestory
In the future of children told
Of what little I have achieved
.

In these moments of darkness I compose
Well formed sentences that hold
The bold autoaesthetic
The sense of self in the world
The sobbing child curled upon
Soft white linen
.

Words wrung from the torments
Of our mother
Words stung from the unbalanced minds
Of possessive lovers
Words lunge at the passing suggestive whisper
Of love
Words greed and fill the empty needs
Of love
.

Words that last until the last
Tywarnhayle darkness
Are washed away on the whim of
Saint Piran's porth
And I sit and wait
For that light again
So that I may scribble what little
I may achieve
In those rare moments
.

Sitting here upon this bridge
In the dead of night
The street lamp turns on
One minute in every five
And I am startled in each turn
For all the lessons I may have learned
From this
.

The Replacement

The microchip popped in for a chat
It didn't have a lot to say
It just sat down in my chair and sent me away
Out into the void of the unemployed
I asked it for my job back and it got annoyed
It stamped its little plastic foot and kicked me out the door
It sneered at me through the letter box as I sprawled out on the floor
I could still hear it laughing as I crawled into the street and I bumped into a Bobby who was thrilling to the beat
A machine strapped to his shoulder dictating his every move
A centralized computer to keep him in the groove
I could see my reflection In the toe cap of his boot
I could tell by his reaction that my presence didn't suit
His idea of efficiency
I didn't fit his plan
So I offered a sickly smile
Got up and ran
Down to the cafe in search of relief
I opened the door and crumpled up with grief
The big and friendly waitress whose finger nails were never quite clean
Was signing on the dole somewhere
She'd been replaced by a machine

Only As Far As The Next Dream

Golden
She leaps
And is nestled within my solar plexus
With such joy
That the seed of life threatens to leave us
In despair
.

She holds in surprise as we withdraw
Doubts for only the moment
She curls within me
Courses through our veins
The unity providing
.

"Where are we?" I hear you say
Speaking with my soul
In yourself ...
I answer "Here"
.

I awoke for awhile
We spoke still in our mind
We never met as our souls departed.
.

Besieged by the doubts of social understanding
Your heart lies
Lost
To fall from so high
The agony of landing
Should we forget the treatment
Closing eyes to ecstasy unbelieved
.

In truth ...
We are only as far as the next dream
In our sleepless nights of ecstasy
Like silent flights, flawed with perfection
The pained erection has no meaning
.

And so from within me look as you did before
Recall the off-shore wind with latent nostalgia
That scent revealing the unremembered
Something learnt
It's not as far as it seemed ...
.

Old Attitudes

She 'ad legs right up to 'er armpits
And tits so huge she wore blusher on 'er bits
Which moved above the rest of the dress she wore
.

"Cleavage," me Dad said
"Deep gorges to bury yer 'ead in"
.

"Knock ya dead if she rolled over sudden"
.

Cor! Me Dad wouldn't 'alf like to give 'er one
Ride 'er bare back 'e would
None of that there rubber crap
'E was a man, me Dad
.

Poets and Priests

There is an argument
One that clowns augment
That considers the idea
Oh, the tears shed this way
That one day
.

The meek will inherit the earth
The birth of an artist will be celebrated for its worth
And holy men will be born
not shorn from some theological college
.

A calibrated plan
Man has always considered their place
Poets and priests unlace their bowls for alms
The charms of these innocents is somehow lost in a bar room foray
Where social security payments support the socialist dream
Licensed Victuallers associations
And an array of Welfare State advertising schemes
.

And all this means constant employment
Without payment
For poets and priests
The very least we could do
Who supports who?
.

Gone in a Second

There is blood on the hands of a political move
A stain in the ocean for the men who have died
A notion in a moment of national pride
Lives gone in a second with the change of the tide
.

Dogs at the gate howl for blood, on a single button pressed
Away from the eyes of another victim's gun
A pilot's solemn explanation for the death of this Argentine son
"I felt sick but I knew it had to be done."
.

And so a child to be born the very next day
Is amid the prayers of our boys as they drown in the sea
A death to their morals in an Archbishop's hypocrisy
A festival rising for this Churchian folly
.

The teachings of a Church devoid of Christ
Learned by the brain in a media heist
They couldn't cry once but they shouted twice
Excuses for a cheek unturned
.

There is death in the hands of a political move
A strain at the consideration of an Empire's cause that has died
A notion in a moment of national pride
Lives gone in a second with the change of the tide
.

Dear Sis, I Can't Sleep For The Sound Of Your Head Banging.

Dear Sis,

I can't sleep for the sound of your head banging
These walls are too thin in this world of ours
I can't sleep for the powers of castration in your eyes
Honed on the balls of the men you despise
.

Dear Sis, You Wouldn't See A Working-Class Girl Behave Like This.

Dear Sis,
.

You wouldn't see a working-class girl behave like this
Say it with a kiss
Of elegant schooling
Gentle brutality
Compounding reality
In trite words
Of remarkable arrogance
.

The dance of the middle-class lady-class
fighting for a chance
of equal representation in ...
middle-class arts ...
middle-class power struggles ...
working-class beds ...
.

A noble cause no doubt
.

Spoken apparent but they don't need to say
She is the easiest lay for the working-class male
If he's prepared to agree with her arrogant tale
The gory detail of middle-class ass
.

Dear Sis, Only In England Are We This Silly About It.

Dear Sis,
.

Only in England are we this silly about it
The cropped heads and wood-chopper swagger
Of women who have suffered at the hands of men
A handicap made more obvious than physical defect.
.

Here
In public
They display
Corrupted bodies
In pseudo-diffident defiance
Of things to come
.

The physically handicapped
Have much more grace
In such matters
.

Bannerism
At the heart of a subject so poor
Women who would rather slog it out
Toe to toe
Like any good buddy
Than caress the soul
.

Only in England
Does Aphrodite climb from her adoration
To spit in the eye of man
.

Dear Sis, Tar Can (For Sylvia Kantaris)

Her, "Darling, but I know better than you," soliloquy
Demonstrates
I have no doubt
The advantage of a University Education.
Inspiration taught by twentieth century poetry
At the hands of...
.

Her, "Darling, but I know better than you," soliloquy
Qualifies her to cast forgiveness upon a contemporary's dismissive manner
Forgiven with the wave of a hand
And an "I'm a published Poet" smile
While it is quite obvious contempt
That meant ...
.

Her, "Darling, but I know better than you," soliloquy
And an understanding of continental surrealist poetry
Gave emphasis to her membership of
Elite-Cornish-Subdivision-Poetry Mafioso
The badge of which is ...
.

Her "Darling, but I know better than you." soliloquy
.

Prostitute

They don't give a hoot for the prostitute
Somebody to suit every need
Another body to loot with every greed
A cut and dried thrust in the lust of the moment
A pavement companion on a cold and empty night
A motor car delight as he shows her the big one
"I can't take that tonight!"
As she shows it to her friend
"I've heard tell about this one."
The girl says demurely
But to the plea in his eyes they are shaking their heads
.

Yet one can accommodate a compromise on the offer of a fiver
A wrist and a hanky borrowed from her friend
Too late for her to worry if her son sleeps securely
In a bed bought and paid for by the work of the day
Too late to say "I'm sorry"
From a town the boy has never heard of or a city far away
The price to pay for liberation in the nineteen sixties
And the tricks they never taught a generation
.

Her own mother smiles at the compensation
Her loving daughter has paid her
- A new microwave oven -
Courtesy of the many men who laid her only child
And smiled the last time they thought of her
They never saw her as someone else's daughter
.

Someone else's daughter lights the lamps tonight
Someone else's daughter battens her tale down tight
A story never told in her old age
A private illustration of man's rage
A page of her history for a husband to conceal
A page of her history only magistrates can reveal
A collage of memories that no longer seem real
A barrage of faces giving sex, appeal
.

Each Day to Ealing Broadway (II) : On Time

The streets are seeped with their chatter and noise
The morning cascade from the train ushers the men and the boys
As they vie for position at the head of the crowd
That emerges loud and a tremble from the station in Ealing
And the rush to the High Street that has them awake and feeling
Driven by self importance and reeling with pride
They hide their moments of indiscretion on the ride
To be "on time."
.

The Londoner
A working-class boy
Has his mind still locked in that shocked sentiment
That rattle and sound
As he rushes along the streaked street
And considers the urgency to be "on time."
.

In his mind
The petty things
Not the pretty things
.

In his heart
The fear
The hurt
And the grime
As each morning he runs from the train
To be "on time"
.

And the pain rises up from the depth of his soul
As he fears he may lose
Another job
Another goal
.

A service distinct
To the few
Has left limitations on what he can do
.

You boy!
You can work in a factory
Or a shop
People from these estates
Never go to college
So you just stop
That kind of thinking
Right now
.

Know your race
Be true
English working-class boy
Know your place
If you want to do well.
.

In London schools
Working-class boys are taught
To be good working-class boys
To be good factory workers
To work in a shop
To fiddle the books a little on the side
The working-class privilege
The ride humored and hidden
.

He makes it to the doorway
And that familiar smell
The street
The clothing
The gutter swell
The stench of the bins
The secret corners where the night before
Were committed unspeakable sins
.

His boss is there
As always
Before
To "open up"
To unlock the door
He is happy to see the Londoner arrive "on time"
For he too is a boy from the same streets
"You'll go far!" he jibes.
As he hides the stick by the till
With luck today
There will be no one to kill
.

Each Day To Ealing Broadway

The streets are streaked with the excretum
Of a thousand late-nighters
The caresses of industry and the morning chill
Have arrested the urge to kill
In the drunks that have spilled
Into the streets at closing time
And now sleep
.

The 7:30 tube train hussles girls
With shields against stares
That with lust peel to reveal
Shy and freshly showered young bodies
Whose language
Sitting cross armed and cross legged
Can leave only despair in the observing eye
And a rye dismissal
A rejection of the hunt
In the ignorant mind
That can only mutter in response
The phrase "Stupid cunt"
.

Morning ignorance inflicted on pretty bare flesh
Faces glares from the hardened and mature stress
Of women that have been there
The scars hardened in the innocent crushed
The absence of tenderness
In the face of the rushed
.

The tube carriage rage
That leaves the commuter's page for the day
With the tense portrait
Of the face that espresses hate
Because the girls cannot hide
From the lust of the ride
The demanding stares of the tube train ride
Each day to Ealing Broadway
.

New Bond Street

So chic
So expensive
and neat
So New Bond Street
.

So Cambridge scarfed
So daft
So Oxford Street
So tongue tied
So Old School Tie.
So, Tiffany is here
So what?
So Cartier open later
10 am
They can
I imagine
afford to lie in
.

The street corner
telephone box
contains cards
from French girls
who offer
every
kind of service.
New model from Paris
Just for pleasure
Near by
Local
Add a continental flavor to your life!
In
luxurious
French
atmosphere
.

So chic
So expensive
and neat
So New Bond Street
.