Reggie Maudling: Consensus Politics 1951-79

Not my best poem and perhaps not even a good poem, but how many people have written any sort of poem about the Rt. Hon Reginald Maudling MP, leave alone a sonnet?

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(After reading Lewis Baston)

“God be merciful to a soul of this gentleman’s way of thinking.”

 

A splendid dinner – wine, cigars and port;

Some chat of Butskellism, Keynsianism
And sad decline. Later, ‘Come Dancing’, caught
On TV, sparkles with cosy pragmatism.

And then the Sixties and the dash for growth –

Abortion, youth and drugs; coarseness creeps in;
Morning meetings idly dissect a graph,
Perfumed by jugs of Dubonnet and gin.

Corruption festers; Ireland thrashes in hate;

But the caviar and swimming pool days
Are done; the gifts and commission men wait
Exposure; a weary decade decays:

All ends in the Winter of Discontent

And Margaret Thatcher with a terse intent.

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© May 2013