ENGLISH MAN @ HOME.

Sun burned and blistered and layered in smoke,
And deluding ourselves of the need to find work;
With this misconception we were brought up to believe
How we are defined by our labour in life.

I am not going to take it for one more new day.
I am not going to edit the words that I say.
I am not going to bear all the ties anymore.
I am going to make all my clothes stand alone.

Written in prose by the screen or the bar,
A modified verse falling down to the floor.
With a nod to the cast and a kiss for the director
I can alight without fear of reflection.

You are not going to pander to futile rewards.
You are not going to worry if debt’s at the door.
You are not going to idol yourself in your bed.
You are going to take charge of your own life instead.

Subjective and envied and complemented;
I can now make my house look like home reinvented,
And preparing the meals for my family’s grace
I’ll be able to introduce taste.

We are not going to be shaped by what we do.
We are not going to hang out with the pensionable few.
We are not going to tip our hats and our voice.
We are going to embrace all the options of choice.

Not working for somebody else’s vacation,
Or performing all day for their feigned admiration;
Now I’m taking the jam from the jar I constructed,
And it’s working now I’m not inducted.

They are not going to tell you to do anything.
They are not going to teach all the tuneless to sing.
They are not going to embarrass us all in the course.
They are going to give us the life we deserve.

Sun dried and twisted and prostrate in the fold,
Values we caught from the national cold;
What did we ever catch that contained any truth?
Anguish for England and rain on the roof.

I believe we were abandoned then called animals.
I believe they bequeathed us their trades without tools.
I believe I am more than the sum of my age.
I believe you do not need their knowledge.

And when any one wonders where any path goes,
Or opens their mouth to protest at the road;
Put one foot in it and then both to stand,
Upright and be counted, one finger, one hand.