This is me, Eccles

This is me, Eccles
This is me, Eccles

Thursday 29 November 2012

The poetry of Rowan Williams

Many readers will know that Rowan Williams, the outgoing Archbishop of Canterbury, is also a talented poet. While helping to tidy up after the recent Anglican General Synod (washing the blood off the floor, etc.) we came across a document in his handwriting, which suggests that he was practising this skill during the Synod.

Father Williams

You are old, Father Williams.

"You are old, Father Williams," the young man said,
"And your church has become very wild.
They don't seem to notice that you're at the head -
And Giles Fraser just screams like a child."

"In my youth," the Archbishop said, watching them fight,
"I thought all my flock could agree;
But now I've a subject on which they'll unite - 
They're all feeling angry with me."
Que sera sera,
Whatever Welby, Welby...
No, that's been done...

Bishop

My bishop's got a red, red, nose.

My bishop's got a red, red, nose,
From drinking too much port.
His wife could do the job as well - 
Now, there's a brilliant thought!
If...

If...

If you can bind the Church of England tighter,
And get it to calm down, if not agree,
About just who's allowed to wear a mitre
And run a diocese - that is, a see...
If you can reconcile the Lib and Evo
With Anglo-Cath and rabid Atheist,
Then, when at last you're given the old heave-ho, 
And go to Cambridge, maybe you'll be missed.
Nothing like a dame

There is nothing like a dame...

We got Durham, Ely, London,
We got Birmingham and York,
We got Winchester and Bradford,
(Now that's one who loves to talk!)
We got Liverpool and Norwich,
And a lot more calling names!
What ain't we got?
We ain't got dames!

3 comments:

  1. It's a godawful small affair
    To the priest with with the mousy hair
    But the synod are yelling no
    And the laity have told her to go
    And the Ms Chakrabati is nowhere to be seen.
    Now she walks through her sunken dream
    And she's hooked to the tv screen
    But the News is a saddening bore
    For she has lived it ten times or more



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  2. We aint got dames
    Eccles aint got brains
    im a poet
    and i didnt know it

    ReplyDelete
  3. Where Is The Third Way

    ...the real Protestant sort
    We'll line up the Anglo-catholics and take them to the port
    Off to Rome
    Heave ho
    Or back to the college class
    To concieve another insincere theology
    Insincere Anglican...
    Or at least half and half?

    Part Two:

    Look its Aquarius
    Rising in the East
    The Western bastards all rejected
    For their postmodern fanfare
    The West will not survive with secular-humanists in the church
    Lets send 'em to Rome with the Anglo-Catholics
    Hey Archbishop nice hair.

    © S. Wesley Mcgranor

    ReplyDelete