No, no, no,
that's not how it happened at all.
Precocious children
have never been afforded that much influence
and Emperors, then as now
are largely unafflicted by shame.

And it's a good thing too
- why, if the story had gone
the way Anderson had it,
neither I nor any of the men of the town
would have our jobs
at the Magic Cloth factory

You do realise
that the trade in Magic Cloth
supports all the world's major economies now,
don't you?

Nor would the aristocracy
look half so stylish,
sashaying hither and thon
in the glorious altogether,
applauded by the taste-makers
and notably contemptuous
of child-like observation.

The grunt and swagger
is there, now, at the age of eleven -
the knowledge that, physically bigger,
his will can be enforced
without wit or compassion.

Worse than this,
she acquiesces,
any attention better than none.
And observing this graceless parody
of adulthood,
I feel sudden vertigo
gazing down the hopeless years

I want to bellow,
"Be unbridled!  There's more to life
than servitude!"
But she trusts the empty affirmation
she has been trained
to aspire to -
she's worth it.

Silly old man.
You don't understand
the world anymore.
We tried emancipation and equality
and it wasn't for us,
so stop confusing the kids
and let them be.

Hakim sat
on the banks of the Euphrates,
his discarded newspaper
lifting, page by page,
on the warm wind.

He had been reading of the countless dead.

Of course, his mind played first
over those he had known.
An uncle, two brothers,
his mother
and a grandfather of ninety six.

All of them,
definitely gone.

But according to the paper,
atop the official body count
some twenty thousand souls
may or may not
have survived the conflict,
and his head swam
with this crowded limbo
and the knowledge
that no-one knew.

Enough people
to populate a small town,
possibly dead.
Not important enough
for anyone to be sure.
And Hakim, eyes
glazed in the dusty sunshine,
began to wonder
whether he was one of them,
the uncounted,
the unacknowledged,
wandering vacantly
through his outstayed welcome,

simpy waiting
for someone
to write down
his name.

Marooned on a desert island
the boys sit patiently
waiting for a mobile signal.

At last, the bolder ones set out
in search of free wi-fi,
while the boffin tries to figure out
the cheat mode which will release them.

Food in trees
remains inaccessible
in the absence of ropes and harnesses
- these lads know their health and safety.

Slowly fading, bitter, helpless
the children fantasize
about who they can sue over this fiasco.

Piggy is the last one standing
for obvious reasons.

The frantic crackling log
sends forth a chemical lament,
filling the room with ghostly branches,
spectral sunlit needles
against blue skies
the laugh and chatter of us as children,
hiding and seeking from trunk to trunk
and climbing, resin scented,
to where the blue **** perch and squabble.
This dying breath
contains the whole life
and we sit, breathing it in,
remembering.

He had never realised
that everything was moving
until it stopped

One pill
and the joyous ramshackle journey
dug claws into the soil
and froze

and turned

The things he had known as trees
began to bend
to curl towards him
gnarled eyes glaring,
tendrils groping

The dog, his faithful companion
rose painfully on two legs
grew shoulders, arms
bared fangs and snarled

Rocks rose from snoring mountains
to grind their ancient jaws at him
and the sea folded in on itself
in disgust

Paralysed he stared
as the sky climbed down
defeated
and the sun pulled back
its shining mask
to show the grinning, vengeful skull beneath

Nothing could touch him
but all could see him
exposed, brutal, foolish, ridiculous
and desperate, desperate

for death.

Well it was Tarquin's idea, actually.
It came to him after watching 'Slumdog Millionaire.'
Have you seen it?  Marvellous film.
Such resourceful people.

Anyway, we were looking at schools,
and the local comprehensive -
simply ghastly - we couldn't put Eugene through that.

But two blocks away
there's a school for the blind.
Ofsted simply raved about it.
So, we popped the old eyes out
- easy as
- and Bob's your uncle.

He starts in August.
More tea?