Poems on the Blunderground

[davywavy]

London Underground has a rather charming little initiative which they call 'Poems on the Underground'. If you haven't seen it, this takes the form of short pieces of poetry on advertising hoardings inside the carriages. Often this is modern poetry and so it neither rhymes nor scans (and so isn't real poetry in my book), but they have thrown up some real gems which I have in the past made a note of and used in other writings.
I'm not sure what the point of 'Poems on the Underground' is. Presumably LU hope that the calming effect of poetry upon their passengers* will prevent us from storming the driver's compartment en masse and murdering the occupant the next time a strike for more pay is announced (after all, 35 grand and twelve weeks holiday a year for sitting in a cosy cabin on your arse all day is plainly a hard life, isn't it?) and so perhaps some extra peace is acheived in the carriage.
However, none of the poems ever talk about anything like travel. You'd think this was something of an oversight, until you remember that travelling is the last thing LU want to remind you of when you're crammed like sardines into a broken-down train somewhere under Pimlico.
With that in mind, I've written, in the style of AA Milne, a couple of travel-related poems which LU might care to use - I think they'll find they accurately represent the experience of using the London Underground.

Moan, Moan
Ev'ryone complains
The Jubilee Line
Has no working trains

Or alternatively:

Halfway down the tunnel
There's a place where we sit.
There are lots of other places
Just like it.
It isn't in the station
It's somewhere else instead.
Why did I use the Northern Line?
I'm better off dead.

^{*London Underground actually call us 'Customers', but I don't see them acknowledging that we're always right. Quite the opposite, in fact. Anyway, I'm not a customer, I'm a passenger, and I'm be obliged if they didn't forget it. For what I'm paying them for my travelcard, they ought to be calling me 'My Liege', and putting down a red carpet whenever I deign to enter their squalid little hole.}

Comments

[the-mendicant.livejournal.com]

With apologies to Shakespeare:

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, creeps on the petty pace of this train.
To the last syllable of the recorded timetable.
And all our yesterdays, alighted fools.
The way to a dusty station. Out, out, brief carriage
This train's but a walking pace, a poor conveyance
as I strut and fret my hour upon the platform
and the announcer's heard no more - it is a tale
told by an idiot, full of sound and static
signifying nothing.....

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

That's particularly good.

[the-mendicant.livejournal.com]

i'm particularly proud of it! Mind you, I have my English teacher to thank for making me memorise that passage as a punnishment..

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

Excellent.

And you're right about "passengers", too.

I think the NHS in Scotland has started talking about "customers" - probably because everyone is so impatient.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

I think the shift to call users of public services "Customer" when they aren't is a result of the attempts to bring the market into the public sector; what this has resulted in is the same old second rate State-sector service coupled with obnoxoius consultant managment-speak.
That way we get the worst that both have to offer, and none of the benefits of either.

[miss-s-b.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure what the point of 'Poems on the Underground' is.

I would have thought that it's some idiot thinking they are making a knowing reference to "A Poem on the Underground Wall" by Simon and Garfunkel

Lesson for T Blair (aged 9 1/4)

[lapinenoireuk.livejournal.com]

Dear Tony - Please remember that as you pay for "passage" on a train that this makes you a passenger ! likewise people in hospital are patients not "customers" as they have NO choice in being ill.

**************************************

The Surcharge of the Northern Line

(In the style {listen softly and hear him revolve} of Alfred, Lord Tennyson)

"Half a inch, half a inch,
Half a inch onward,
All for the revenue of Ken
Crawled the six hundred.
"Forward, the Northern Line!
"Dash for the seat!" he said:
Into the scruffy train
Shuffled the six hundred.

"Forward, the Northern Line!"
Was there a man dismay'd?
Yes cos' the punters knew
Livingstone had plunder'd:
Their's not to make reply,
Their's not to reason why,
Their's but to … Oyster BUY!:
Into their filthy train
Crawled the six hundred.

Refuse to right of them,
Refuse to left of them,
Refuse in front of them
Rolled underfoot and "stank" them out
Repelled by snot and smell,
Steadfast they crawled and …well,
Into foul Muswell Hill,
Into that mouth of Hell
Crawled the six hundred.

Flash'd all their Metro’s there,
Flash'd as they churned the air,
Ignoring the young mothers there,
Standing with shopping
While all the train wonder'd:
Crawling along it came
with the speed of a snail;
That was due for retiring".

Re: Lesson for T Blair (aged 9 1/4)

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

I seem to have inspired people to write significantly better poetry than me.

I must make sure I don't do that again!

[breekom.livejournal.com]

A long delayed tube
Gives me a minute to think
In the midst of hurry.

Make the delay your own
Go eat a leisurely lunch
The tube waits for you.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Tube Haiku...I think there's a post in that alone.

[reddragdiva]

They were putting up fake poems in March 2003. (I still have the pics from that post somewhere, just not on the linked host.) So if you make up good fakes and put them on, you should have a whale of a time.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

The more I think about doing so, the more tempted I am.

With apologies to Iggy Pop

[the-maenad.livejournal.com]

Oh the passenger
How how he rides
Oh the passenger
He rides and he rides
He looks through his window
What does he see?
A platform full of litter
And a tramp having a pee.

[robinbloke.livejournal.com]

Not a poem; but just in case anyone has missed the London underground (http://www.backingblair.co.uk/london_underground/) song. Warning. Rude and naughty words.