THE REDDER FLAG

 The people’s flag which flew so red

Now flutters from a Twitter thread

Which lauds the Shadow Cabinet

And doesn’t trust the rabbinate.

Mendoza, Mason, Owen Jones

Have generated Twitter clones,

Averse to Jess and Alastair,

Benn fils, the Coup and Tony Blair.

So post a smirking Corbyn gif,

Say ‘When he wins’ but never ‘If,’

The revolution’s on its way,

And then they’ll make the Centrists pay.

Select the red emoji flag,

Revere Ken Loach and Billy Bragg,

Devise a Twitter thunderclap

And buy the new Momentum app.

Tweet angrily of leaders past,

New Labour wasn’t made to last,

So mute the melts and salt the slugs

And fill your CLP with thugs.

 It’s Labour Conference Seventeen

Embrace the whole Momentum scene;

JC’s on all the merchandise

In gaudy and iconic guise

Remainers aren’t allowed much voice,

Their silence is the People’s Choice;

Though Blairites, Jews and Centrists grieve

The Cult won’t rest until they leave.

 So raise the scarlet banner high

While Jezza rules, dissent must die,

And social democrats of yore

Won’t raise the red flag any more.

 

 MINDING YOUR PMQs

At Wednesday noon in PMQs
The Parties are embattled
Some say that Corbyn’s smashing it,
That May is sounding rattled,
That Corbyn doesn’t speak ad hoc
But looks down at his notes
And all sides say their party
Will be scooping up the votes.
The SNP sound feisty,
In Holyrood they trust
LibDems these days are tentative
Their numbers not robust;
Backbenchers frame their questions
To support a leader’s claim,
And all sides quote statistics.
No two of them the same.
John Bercow, Mr Speaker,
Calls for chuntering to cease
When the members get too hyper
And the decibels increase,
Some MPs are telegenic
But most, like you and me,
Aren’t folk you’d give a second glance,
If they weren’t on your TV.
A few will be on Question Time
A few are KBEs
And some will end up in the Lords
If they keep well clear of sleaze.
Democracy, said Churchill,
As a system, is the worst,
But compared to the alternatives
It always comes in first.

September 2017