HOW STEPHEN HARPER STOLE POETRY

Everybody left the room an hour ago
Only you have failed to have your fortune read
It's time to pack it in, put out your Marlboro
Everything that gathered here is dead

Forget that tune you're plucking on your mandolin
Forget that song you sing inside your head
The piano doesn't need your variations anymore
It's time to put your fingertips to bed

Put out, put out your cigarette
The stores are closed, the streets are wet
There's nothing that can stop us from destroying you
The jackets are all hanging from their happy little hooks
There's a party in El Salvador
The screams are coming through the floor
It's not your turn, so close the door
The Kommandant is calling you to bed

You thought by hanging round you might learn something more
Or by sticking out your hat you might get fed
Or by rifling your bureau drawer
You might turn up some metaphor
That no one's ever thought about or read
Forget it. Everybody's gone to bed
And everything that mattered here has fled.

Put out, put out your cigarette
Pick up your gun, the streets are wet
There’s nothing that can stop us from deploying you
There’s a coup d’etat in Ecuador
The boys are marching 4 x 4
They used to be alive but now they’re dead

This is where you come down hard
In boots you bought on credit cards
This is where we sever
The affair you thought would last forever

Darling, you're not one of us
You should have boarded that last bus
When everyone got wind that we were here
You should have scattered with the rest
You hung around, you failed the test
You're just a bitter aftertaste
A steaming chunk of human waste
You feasted on our charity
It's time you saw our Face
You're coming to the end of our embrace

(Ann Diamond)