Imprecations on the A120

I have always loved the poems of John Betjeman. Even as a child, the Englishness of his work and the underlying humour in many of his poems captivated me. I remember seeing Sir John at Oxford Circus back in the late sixties or early seventies. I was wandering aimlessly round the west end shops (as was my wont), when I happened to notice the great man, wearing his trademark trilby and a rather shabby raincoat, making his way through the crowds with an other-worldy expression on his face. I like to think that I was the only one who noticed him.

I speculated here on the type of poem dear Sir John, were he alive today, might have written about our reliance on computers. But there are huge swathes of 21st century life -"reality" TV, recession, fears of global warming - that might well prompt him to put pen to paper. However, as I recently bought my first "satnav", I thought that ought to be the poet's next topic. It is loosely based upon Meditation on the A30, and I have attempted, as far as possible, to keep the original rhyme scheme. It is entitled Imprecations on the A120. I hope it will amuse!

A man on his own in a car
Is creating a terrible stink
His effing and blinding’s a product of finding
His satnav has gone on the blink

“She’s stopped telling me where to go,
She should have said ‘left’ at that fork!
This journey is going too slow,
I think I’ll just get out and walk

“Why can’t you just give me directions?
It is your damned job, after all.
My wife said today she’s been playing away
With Derek from near Coggeshall.

“If I had a Garmin, let’s say
Or Tom Tom ‘Go’ with Lane Assist
I’d find Derek’s lair straight away
And introduce him to my fist.

“This satnav is trash, and a waste of my cash, and
I will bin you, God knows I will!”
As he pokes at the screen, he hasn’t yet seen
The DAF truck closing in for the kill.

The Laureate and the Laptop

On the 19th May 1984, that great and (in my view) most English of poets, Sir John Betjeman, died. He was laid to rest in the quiet churchyard of St. Enodoc in Cornwall, a place he loved. Sir John's death came less than four months after the introduction of the Apple Macintosh computer. The 1980s saw great leaps forward in the computer industry; the inception of MS-DOS, the introduction of the floppy disc, and the launch of the Commodore 64, allegedly the best-selling computer of all time.

I'm not entirely sure that Sir John would have been comfortable with computers, had he lived to see their development and the development of the other technology that now surrounds us. I always saw him as a 'fountain pen' sort of poet; scribbling on sheet after sheet of paper, blobbing ink everywhere, scratching out the bits he didn't like...

But one thing is certain about Sir John. For all his apparent other-worldliness, he knew how his fellow-citizens ticked. His poems are full of the ordinary, the mundane, the trivial. How many other poets do you know that have written about the Metropolitan Railway? That's probably why I love his work so much.

I'm probably going to regret this. I've written a little poem in Sir John's style. It fondly imagines that he is still around today, and is (of course!) fully aware of the available technology and its importance to us. And, if you're reading this from somewhere, Sir John - sorry!


Janet, on the train to Ruislip,
Opens up her MacBook’s lid
Takes the dongle from her pocket,
Plugs it in and emails Sid.

‘Are you coming round this evening?
I’ve a brand new shoot-em-up.
And, if you bring round your X-Box,
We’ll replay the last World Cup.’

Sid is deaf to Janet’s missive;
(Hard drive’s melted like ice cream)
And he contemplates the message -
‘Fatal error’ on the screen.

Sadly, Janet, in her bedsit,
Eats a micro-meal alone.
Rests her MacBook on the duvet
Whilst she texts Sid from her phone.

Where are you, you lousy bastard?
Why are you ignoring me?
Sid replies with explanations.
Janet texts, ‘Well, I’m still free.’

But this evening must be fated,
Janet’s credit’s down to nil.
Sidney’s signal strength is zero;
He is angry, she feels ill.

Gentle reader, don’t feel sorry
For this quite unlucky pair
Sidney only lives two minutes
From young Janet’s pied-a-terre.