Granita 2

When Tony Blair dined with the Devil,
they chose the discreetest of dives:
soft candles aglow on a table
that gleamed with long spoons and long knives.

The Devil produced a prospectus,
with bullets and arrows and more,
about the political value
of an artfully engineered war.

"I'll make my luck your luck," he promised.
"Your enemies time after time
will see you escape from their clutches
and swell on the proceeds of crime.

"The leaders of public opinion
will dance to threads dark and discreet,
and as opiate for the electors
I'll keep your economy sweet.

"I can play the sins piano and forte
press down on the pedals of growth
with gluttony, avarice, envy,
while taking it easy on sloth.

"Now to formalise our understanding,"
he said with a sinister leer,
"I'll just make a painless incision
and ask for your signature here."

"Er, look, Nick…" smiled Tony with feeling,
as he carefully weighed his reply,
"you're a gentleman down to your trotters
and I'm known as a pretty straight guy.

"These trappings are so mediaeval!
We're friends and the deal's understood.
There's no call for bodily fluids
or parchments encrusted with blood."

So they settled it just with a handshake,
but Nick turned away filled with gloom
as he closed his executive briefcase
and wondered who'd outsmarted whom.


© Brian Fewster 2005
First published on this site, April 30 2005.


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