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Adrian Henri

Adrian Henri’s Talking After Christmas Blues

Well I woke up this mornin' it was Christmas Day
And the birds were singing the night away
I saw my stocking lying on the chair
Looked right to the bottom but you weren't there
there was
apples
oranges
chocolates
. .. . aftershave
but no you.

So I went downstairs and the dinner was fine
There was pudding and turkey and lots of wine
And I pulled those crackers with a laughing face
Till I saw there was no one in your place
there was
mincepies
brandy
nuts and raisins
. . . mashed potato

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Great War Poems

I.

The same old soldiers walking along the same old skyline

2.

Dead hand through the sandbags reaching out for the cream­and ­white butterfly

3

mud/water under duckboards/mud/rats scamper in starshell darkness/mud/smell of shit and rotting bodies/mud/resting your sweaty forehead on the sandbags OVER THE TOP the first men in the lunar landscape.

4.

What did you do to the Great Whore, Daddy?'

5.

Poppies slightly out­of­focus and farmcarts bringing in the peaceful dead.

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In the Midnight Hour

When we meet
in the midnight hour
country girl
I will bring you night flowers
coloured like your eyes
in the moonlight
in the midnight
hour

I remember

Your cold hand
held for a moment among strangers
held for a moment among dripping trees
in the midnight hour

I remember

Your eyes coloured like the autumn landscape
walking down muddy lanes

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Poem in Memoriam T. S. Eliot

I'd been out the night before & hadn't seen the papers or the telly
& the next day in a café someone told me you were dead
And it was as if a favourite distant uncle had died
old hands in the big strange room/new shiny presents at Christmas
and I didn't know what to feel.

For years I measured out my life with your coffee spoons

Your poems on the table in dusty bed sitters
Playing an L.P. of you reading on wet interrupted January afternoons

Meanwhile, back at the Wasteland:
Maureen OHara in a lowcut dress staggers across Rhyl sandhills
Lovers in Liverpool pubs eating passion fruit
Reading Alfred de Vigny in the lavatory
Opening an old grand piano and finding it smelling of curry
THE STAR OF INDIA FOUND IN A BUS STATION
Making love in a darkened room hearing an old woman having a fit on the landing
The first snowflakes of winter falling on her Christmas poem for me in Piccadilly Gardens
The first signs of spring in plastic daffodils

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The New `Our Times' (for Mix Fénéon)

1

At 3 p.m. yesterday, a Mr Adolphus Edwards, a Jamaican immigrant, was pecked to death by a large Bronze Eagle in Upper Parliament St. A U.S. State Dept. spokesman said later, `We have no comment to make as of this time.'

2

Police­Constable George Williams, who was partially blinded by a 15 lb. jelly baby thrown at a passing pop singer, is to be retired on half­pension.

3

Bearded Liverpool couple put out of misery in night by drip oil heater, court told.

4

A certain Mrs Elspeth Clout, of Huyton, was killed by an unidentified falling object. It was thought to be a particularly hard stool evacuated from the toilet of a passing aeroplane.

5

2 chip­shop proprietors were today accused of selling human ears fried in batter. One of them said `We believe there is room for innovation in the trade:

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Me

if you weren't you, who would you like to be?

Paul McCartney Gustav Mahler
Alfred Jarry John Coltrane
Charlie Mingus Claude Debussy
Wordsworth Monet Bach and Blake

Charlie Parker Pierre Bonnard
Leonardo Bessie Smith
Fidel Castro Jackson Pollock
Gaudi Milton Munch and Berg

Belà Bartók Henri Rousseau
Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns
Lukas Cranach Shostakovich
Kropotkin Ringo George and John

William Burroughs Francis Bacon
Dylan Thomas Luther King
H. P. Lovecraft T. S. Eliot

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Mrs Albion You've Got A Lovely Daughter (for Allen Ginsberg)

Albion's most lovely daughter sat on the banks of the Mersey dangling her landing stage in the water.

The daughters of Albion
Arriving by underground at Central Station
Eating hot ecclescakes at the Pierhead
Writing 'Billy Blake is fab' on a wall in Mathew St
Taking off their navyblue schooldrawers and
Putting on nylon panties ready for the night

The daughters of Albion
See the moonlight beating down on them in Bebington
Throw away their chewinggum ready for the goodnight kiss
Sleep in the dinnertime sunlight with old men
Looking up their skirts in St Johns Gardens
Comb their darkblonde hair in suburban bedrooms
Powder their delicate little nipples/wondering if tonight will be the night
Their bodies pressed into dresses or sweaters
Lavender at the Cavern or pink at the Sink

The daughters of Albion wondering how to explain why they didn't go home

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Tonight at Noon (for Charles Mingus and the Clayton Squares)

Tonight at noon
Supermarkets will advertise 3d EXTRA on everything
Tonight at noon
Children from happy families will be sent to live in a home
Elephants will tell each other human jokes
America will declare peace on Russia
World War I generals will sell poppies in the streets on November 11th
The first daffodils of autumn will appear
When the leaves fall upwards to the trees

Tonight at noon
Pigeons will hunt cats through city backyards
Hitler will tell us to fight on the beaches and on the landing fields
A tunnel full of water will be built under Liverpool
Pigs will be sighted flying in formation over Woolton and Nelson will
not only get his eye back but his arm as well
White Americans will demonstrate for equal rights in front of the Black House
and the Monster has just created Dr Frankenstein

Girls in bikinis are moonbathing

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On the Late Late Massachers Stillbirths and Deformed Children a Smoother Lovelier Skin Job

The seven­day beauty plan:
Avenge O Lord thy slaughter'd saints, whose bones
Will cause up to I million deaths from leukaemia
Forget not, in thy book record their groans
Now for the vitally important step.
Cream your face and neck a second time
No American president world­famous for beauty creams
responsible for the freedom and safety of so many young offenders
TODAY'S MEN OF ACTION
The Triple Tyrant Macmillan Kennedy Watkinson
The West governments are satisfied as to the moral
necessity to resume Racing from Newmarket
EXTRA SPECIAL!
Atmospheric testing: A test card is shown
continuously from to a.m. until 15 minutes
before slayn by the bloody Piemontese
why pay higher fares?
There is always trouble when President Kennedy the jovial
gravel­voiced little sailor
defends glamorous Olive Oyl from contamination of the

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Liverpool Poems

I

GO TO WORK ON A BRAQUE!

2

Youths disguised as stockbrokers
Sitting on the grass eating the Sacred Mushroom.

3

Liverpool I love your horny­handed tons of soil.

4

PRAYER FROM A PAINTER TO ALL CAPITALISTS:
Open your wallets and repeat after me
`HELP YOURSELF!'

5

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