Storm In A Tea Cup Poem by Terence George Craddock (Spectral Images and Images Of Light)

That Art’s Council tea-room in there.
It has got sandwiches for ten dollars!
And fancy cups of foreign coffee for five!
Dressing up cheap common food to put on airs!

Dats lots a Pakeha swilling din dere.
Da got ta play tat mana man sittin ere.
Ant no brows faces in dat sea-oh-white.
Maori no spill de money cept pay night.

Nor are my mates crowding among rich clowns.
We sup service where frugality wears a crown.
Money paid where sobriety is precisely value set.
Value guaranteed in balance procured service let.

Dat bad man. Dat bad man. Dat bad man.
E took dat. E took dat. E took dat.
For de fire water. For de musket. For de glass bead.
For de blanket. Eee sold it. Eee sold it. Eee sold it.

So what were the injustices of the real Land Wars?

Scots cast off land their ancestors bleed crops grew.
Houses flattened homeless refugees no pity given knew?
English Lords were never fair or kind? Too dispossessed you?

Cast out like sheep. Fatherless families. London’s gutters flock.
So new pastures new lords. Filled with sheep in swarming stock.
Scots men. British armies greedily recruited. Grabbed their lot.

Irish up front in genocide queue. A potato failure famine!
Not a lack of food! English ate all else as rated rent!
Eight million Irish and only one million starvation spent?


Copyright © Terence George Craddock