THE NEW REVENGE

Three Tories in the Azores, Bush, Blair and Aznar lay,
And some false reports, like decoy birds,
                                        were deployed from far away:
"Iraq's stores of WMD pose a threat to all us three!"
Then sware dark José Aznar;
                              "'Fore God, though I've come this far,
I cannot follow farther, not even for Gibraltar!
Two in ten of mine will fight.
                     I must pose and then take flight -
And as empires wage their wars,
                              both yours count far more than me!"

Then spake the British PM: "I know you are no peon;
You'll line up for the moment,
                                though you'll trade with me again.
Know I've hundreds MPs more
                                  who, though fed up to the core,
Think their fate's tied to my star.
                                While they loathe you, dear Aznar,
They will yet give up the Rock to the Rightist rule of Spain."

So the Spanish PM slipped somewhat backward down the list,
Till he melted like a cloud in the silence of the heavens;
But slick Tony played, as planned, with the MPs in his hand,
Very artfully and sly,
With Westminster's 'babes' and 'men',
And he stretched them on the back-benches to dry;
Thus, he brought most all aboard,
And they blessed, in loyal sweat,
                   that their bluff was not called yet,
For a future peace-map pledged,
                              meant peace now could be ignored.

So with just two hundred odd placemen
                                  to work the phones and to vote,
Blair homeward headed to Britain to keep his career afloat,
While half his forces were sailing, pre-planned, towards Iraq.
"Vote for peace or vote for war?
Please, dear Tony, page us now,
To rebel's not what we're for!
For we each might lose our seat,
                              should our votes bring your defeat."
Then smooth Tony said again: "We be all good Englishmen.
Let us blame those swine in Paris, whose arguments embarrass,
Let's ensure that they're not heard and their veto call a cheat."

Smooth Tony spoke and he schmoozed,
                   and his sycophants fawned and so,
A Labour government ran on, shamelessly heeling its foe,
With the payroll vote secured,
                              and the Tories supporting the show.
For half his strength from the Right,
                                and half from the Left was drawn,
And a crooked PM ran on ignoring the people's scorn.

For people in millions rose up on the streets and cried,
Millions more in their homes looked on
                                          while the spin doctors lied,
Raging on and on, till betrayed
By their Christian scaremonger, he of endless 'moral' wars,
And up-shadowing high above them
                            with their yawning bomb bay doors,
Loomed the B-52s, and they prayed.

And while now the great Bush White House
                                          hung above all like a cloud
Whence the thunderbolt will fall - long and loud,
Five nations drew away
From the US side that day,
And would not by their 'Yes' vote
                      and would not by their 'No' vote say,
That the battle thunder came from them all.

But anon the great Bush White House,
                                          it revealed itself and went,
Having found among its allies
                      some whose will could not be bent,
And with Blair planned the invasion,
                   of a sovereign foreign land.
For every time they'd pleaded
                        with slides and taped 'phone calls,
And every time Blix showed them up,
                                                  as a true witness recalls
When he cuts a false case down from the stand.

And the sun went down and the stars came out
                                          far over Westminster's halls,
But never a moment ceased the fight
                              of the Whips and the few with balls.
Time after time, the whole night long,
                                    some high flown speeches came,
Time after time, the whole night long,
                            with their empty thunder and blame;
Time after time, the whole night long,
                        drew back in bribe, blunder and shame.
For some were bought and many were bullied,
                                  and so could fight on no more -
God of battles, was there ever a scuttle
                                        like this in the world before?

People cried, "Fight on! Fight on!"
Though their Party seemed all but purblind.
It had chanced that,
                when all Blair's respect for the law was gone,
With a true heavy heart to parade Cook promptly resigned,
And a Statement on him
                      that was plotting war, suddenly showed,
That he'd only be wounded
                              not forced from his family's abode;
Still they cried, "Fight on! Fight on!"

Yet the vote went down and the darkness grew
                                        far over a shamed country,
And the States' air fleets with shadowed wings
                                      spread overhead like a stain;
But they dared not furlough their men
                              for they feared the people's disdain.
So Blair watched what the cost would be.
For people who'd fought him he said,
Stood in perilous jeopardy,
Seeing sixty of their two hundred were fled,
And half of the rest black-listed for life
In their clash with their arrogant, self-serving leader's strife;
And the sickened down in the square
                                      were burning with anger there,
With their placards all broken and bent,
                                  and with rekindled rage, unspent;
And the honour and pride of their Party tossed to one side;
But mad Tony cried in his English pride:
"We have fled such a flight for these days and this night
As may never be fled again!
We've sucked up completely, my men!
And a day less or more
At peace or at war,
I'll win - does it matter when?
Sink the UN, craven Party - sink her, split her in twain!
Rather fall into the hands of Bush,
                                    and the greedy palms of Spain!"

And the Party said, "Aye, Aye," but the people made reply:
"We have children, we have wives,
And while Bush still spares our lives,
We shall make those bastards fearful,
                                    when we win, what we will do;
We shall fight and fight again to reverse their wicked coup."
For they'd felt their strength in millions
                                    and would have revenge in full.

And the State Department's men,
                                to their bosom clasped Blair then,
And the Pentagon at last, could recall his name - if asked,
And Bush praised him to his face
                                    with his vacant Southern 'grace';
So he rose with their medal and he cried:
"I have fought for God - my friend - as a reborn man and true;
I have only done your bidding - as a saint is bound to do:
For we know, both you and I, our home's beyond the sky!"
And he fell upon their necks and he lied.

And Blair stared past the dead
                              that had been so peaceful and free,
And had holden the power and glory of Bush so cheap,
Trusting in Labour's leader of the West's democracy;
Was he devil or man? He was devil, for aught they could see!
So they sank his soul past hatred far into Hell's pit deep,
And they sought their revenge by the Saudi Arabian sea,
Far away, where they mourned
                        for their loss and longed for their own;
When a wind from the lands
                              Blair had ruined awoke from sleep,
And the waters began to heave and the weather to moan,
And ever that decade had ended a storm broke free,
And the waves of a great earthquake grew like a tsunami,
Till they smote on far lands and their lives
                                          and their hopes ever few,
And the black whirlwind was reaped
                        by the law-breaking rulers we blame
And the world's revenge
                    at last came down on that wicked crew
To be lost evermore in their shame.

                    (Apologies to Alfred, Lord Tennyson)