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Poetry
BALLAD OF PYNES HILL HOUSE
By John Andrews & Steve Walsh
After learning the fate of the Medical Sickness Group
A bit unfair to PHD. and to Oscar Wild.
When Pynes Hill House was built for MSG the GM had installed in the
Atrium a magnificent Palm tree 10m or more tall. There was great
speculation about whether it would survive as leaves were always dying
off - a natural occurrence. The Permanent Insurance, part of the
MSG was sold off to Equitable, and Medical Sickness was eventually
merged with Wesleyan.
I never saw a man who looked
With such a gleeful eye
Upon that Pynes Hill building
Where the domes shoot to the sky
And where the atrium is filled
With a palm tree that has died.
I only knew what haunted thought
Quickened his step. and why
He looked upon the garish day
With such a gleeful eye.
The man had sold the family silver
And so the end is nigh
And he has sold us down the river
By each let this be heard
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word
The coward does it with a smile
The brave man he is heard
He does not rise in piteous haste
To put on convicts clothes
He sits in his office and smiles and gloat
Each cuff linked-twitched pose,
Fingering a gold watch which ticks
Are like horrible hammer-blows.
He did not wring his hands nor weep,
When the palm tree died.
But drank the air as though it held
Some healthful anodyne:
With open mouth he drank the sun
As though it had been wine!
And I and all the souls in pain,
Who saw his smarmy smile,
Forgot if we ourselves had done
A great Equitable thing,
And watched with gaze of dull amaze
The man who ought to swing
He did not wring his hands nor weep,
When the palm tree died.
He washed his hands of everything
Implicit were his lies
But I never saw a man who looked
So gloatingly at the sky
He does sit with five yes men
Who watch him night and day
Who watch to see if he ever weeps
And to which God he does pray
And watch if he himself would rob
The prisoners of a rise in pay.
I never saw a man who looked
With such a gleeful eye
Upon that Pynes Hill building
Where the domes shoot to the sky
And where the atrium is filled
With a palm tree that has died
For strange it was to see him pass
With a step so light and gay
And strange it was to see him look
So gladly at the day
And strange it was to think that he
Received such a rise in pay
For pine and palm have pleasant leaves
That in the springtime shoot
But grim to see the redundancies
Which now Wesleyan funds have bought
And free were we as men must be
Before the merger bears fruit
He lay as one who lies and dreams
In a pleasant meadow-land
The watchers watched him as he slept
And could not understand
How one could sleep so sweet a sleep
A hundred and sixty thousand pounds in hand
But there is no sleep when insurance clerks weep
Who never yet have wept
So we, of the service industry
That endless vigil kept
And through each brain on hands of pain
Another terror crept
Alas it is a fearful thing
To feel another’s mishap
For right within the sword of sin
We’re outsourced to a firm called CAP
And as molten lead were the tears we shed
For yet another stinging slap
Golden handcuffs now around us tell
Many redundant men we were
Wesleyan has thrust us from it’s heart
And Medical Sickness from it’s care
And the iron gin that waits for sin
Unemployment we’re in it’s snare
Yet each man kills the thing he loves
By each let this be heard
Some do it with a bitter look
Some with a flattering word
The coward does it with a kiss
The brave man with a sword
Some love too little, some too long
Some sell and others buy
Some do the deed with many tears
And some Without a sigh
For each man kills the thing he loves
So a palm tree has to die
I never saw a man Who looked
With such a gleeful eye
Upon that Pynes Hill building
Where the domes shoot to the sky
And where the atrium if filled
With so many hearts that died
Page last updated: 23 Feb 2009 |