Monday 13 June 2011

IFFY

IFFY (A Kiplingesque look at the Westminster Ethos)

If you can catch his eye when all about you are would-be heirs, eager to catch it too;
If you can get rosetted for a safe seat - be voted in - yet think they voted “you”
If you can fawn and not be galled by fawning or, being out-fawned, plot the sod’s demise,
Then, sidelined, coolly wait for that new dawning, and bide your time with rivals none the wize

If you can carry-can for some disaster - not of your making - and display no pain;
If you can meet with whips and saints of plaster and bow to both and never once abstain;
If you connive at crafted untruth spoken by twisted knave to beat the voter-mules
And watch their trust, invested in you, broken, and stoop to further dupe the bloody fools;

If you can made a heap of wild expenses and care for Code of Conduct, not one toss,
Then meekly give some back, to mend his fences, and save the red face of the party boss;
If you contrive your bile and gorge to batten as you ask crass set-questions in The House,
And so gain crumbs that your lean status fatten, as you aspire to: ‘Senior Servile Louse’;

If you can subvert crowds with faux charisma, or meet a Queen - with neither gaining much;
If you can breathe that Westminster miasma; if all folk count with you - as prop or crutch;
If you can fill Big Ben’s impostured minute with party games and politician-fun,
Then surely - as PM - you’ll drop us in it, and we’ll have got ourselves another one!