The National Opera & Ballet Theatre, Minsk – creating the building before creating the art
It was darker then
It was darker then
The day dulled before the dawn
As I pulled up the flap of the future
memories crawled like maggots towards my heart
abandoned like fresh roadkill
in the path of the emotional bulldozers
clearing the way ahead, blinding the traffic
in the glare of the new Glasnost.
We were all party members in the old days
Card carrying pessimists, romance politicals,
Intolerant love Bolsheviks in a red mist of fury
Our angry love demanding manifesto pledges
Ahead of marriage vows as protest marched on.
It was darker then
In the no men and women’s land
Between the trenches of the past and future
When the red seeped into the white
Like an embolism of emotion
Bruising the perfect untouched ideas of a generation
Used to pumping blood in vain.
And as today’s clarion speeches are left in toilets
And whistle blowers purse their lips in dismay
We wonder why the great barricades
Look designer-made, as the would-be heros
audition on reality TV
and the everyday Watergates burst open
with tiny pustular pops and the dogs of headlines
whimper and eye the storybones with suspicion
wondering what teeth are for when we are all vegetarian now.
It was darker then
When I brokered my first love deal
And gingerly felt the mutual bumps of our ambition
Debating great men and their place in dialectical materialism
Writing rapier essays that hurt to read
Because the words we used were the clubs we belonged to
And the blows we clubbed with
We were the boys of the Brigade
Part of the loose, easy movement, falling like the Berlin Wall
And the statue of Stalin fleeing St Petersburg.
It was darker then
With love blocked by Communism
And the father of future Milibands altering his salutation from Adolf
leaving Warsaw for the West End watering holes
While the State in Capitalist Society plays Polo by Ralph Lauren
And Tariq the Street Fighting Man
Plays Glastonbury in an ash and chestnut yurt
Whilst the reluctant fans of austerity hurt
and blurt out their pain in little red books
From Redchurch Street, E2.
It was darker then
Before the revolution of the revolving doors
And the advent of the insurrection chic
Standing in front of the tank tops in Trafalgar Square
Not backing down until the petition is signed
100,000 times online
we operate behind the lines
we are the subversives, submerged with guilt about coming out on top
we leak quietly like a million twitch-eyed whistle blowers
in a silent movie by Dali and Bunuel.
I screamed in silence for years
exploring the blade-edge in avant-garde suffering,
an impressionist pavement preacher in Paris
painting love in angles and tears, until I met you,
until the sunlight floodlines filtered into a new Perestroika
in the smallest empire in the world
called you and me.
Roy Stannard 4th July 2013
Live on air reading TW9Y 4.7.13 here:
Roy Stannard's Blog 
Just so good, Roy. Still leaving me contemplating any hidden meanings I may have missed. And there are so many. One of the best so far.
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Thanks Andrew
As usual, lots to catch up about..I appreciate you taking time out to read this.
Roy
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