A new addition has turned up in HORRID HEROES AND CRAZY CROOKS by David Clement-Davies, which may feel a little odd, since characters were meant to be either fictional or historical. But needs must…
THE LOVE SONG OF VLADIMIR PUTIN
Now here’s a song, to put the boot in
The dangerous loves of Mr Putin
And if you’ve read that book sublime
A strong-man – Hero of Our Time?
That lyric tale of Russian Caucus
Whose soldier’s proved a trifle raucous
With camps and duels, horses, spies
All unredeemed by Bella’s eyes.
The sort where bad guys pull it off,
You know, the one by Lermantov.
But all’s made up, just like the Bible
You see we have to watch for libel!
So Putin mighty, Putin sure –
Yet put in ranks of the mature!?
Great leader of the Russian Bear
Who rose, with such a chilling flair,
From humble ranks of FSB
To join today’s Celebrity.
An iron Russian Premier who
Loves Judo, hunting and Kung Fu.
No look of crook, nor peasant farmer
No protocol to shame Obama.
No hint of scandal round this chum,
With rumours of Polonium
Injected in that fleeing fella
Who met his end, by stealth umbrella.
Who wouldn’t dream of reckless ire
If Newsnight talked Politkovskya!
But why should Russia drop its fist
To just some murdered journalist?
Since Putin penned a PHD
On how to earn some honest fee
And keep those Robber barons loyal,
All greased by pipelines pumping oil,
Or while the fracking starts a rash,
Fired up with ‘Merkel’ rush of gas.
That blood that lights the vital spark
In every Russian Oligarch,
Until they challenge word official
Or fall by process – just judicial.
Who hates environmental wailing
Just like his soul mate, Sarah Palin.
No worry if some arctic flair
Might soon put pay to polar bear
Or toxic dumping be the spree
Consuming withered Aral sea.
Who’ll tip his hat, so newly felted
When north pole ice has surely melted
And raise a rifle, like a sniper
To hunting seal, or arctic piper.
A man who’s not ashamed to say
Of course he likes it warm or gay
And when we’re sure of basic diet
We’ll never crush a Pussy Riot!
Olympics crown his neighbourhood
To teach the world, Sochi – so good.
(It’s just one thought that still afrights
Some real talk of Human Rights.)
Then West have rubbed gainst Eastern grain
In business dealings in Ukraine
Despite the fact corruption rich
Was right to end Yan-ukovich.
A straining there to even rhyme
In darkening talk of crooks or crime!
While all those bodies in the square
Showed up a pure, defiant stare,
And in the guts of struggling Nation
Revealed the human desperation.
Something owed to fighting few,
That Moscow now miscalls a coup.
But since the old regime has fled
The Russian Bear now lifts its head.
To put-in boys to old Crimea
And share the glitz of Vladimir!
Not Comrades now, too hip by far,
But brothers, like that Russian Czar
Who knew Size matters most of all
From Moscow to Sevastapol.
Like Stalin, cast on Yalta beach,
With certain sense of over-reach
Whose grim world view could only grip
Inevitable dictatorship!
While plans for votes are now unfurled
Like ten bad days that shook the world.
You see, this democratic chap
Long got his whiskers in a flap
As freedom’s loving stepped too far
In fracking up the S.S.R.
(Which needs a U. with clear sight,
To make the social tides Unite)
But then it should be no surprise
That ancient Russian sense of size,
And ever the fight of what defiles
Twixt Westerners or Slavophiles,
Is modern freedom still the goal
Or triumph of some Russian Soul?
So now the World waits on the brink
And deals in diplomatic ink
Obama calls and John Mcain
Tells everyone to raise their game
While Whithall, true to bureaucratic vision,
Prepares to deal in cynicism
As London energy men all smile
At fuel price, long hiked a mile,
Like bankers on a spending spree
Delighted by monopolies.
Enough to spread that thought so mad
That Putin isn’t quite THAT bad,
Or FSB should swap the tanks
For shiny suits in Scottish banks!
Or is it horses running courses
In all the scramble for resources,
That makes Crimea all the rage
As Nations rush for centre stage?
Will Russia still not deviate
Despite boycotts or cracked G8,
Did freedom carve a broken plaque
With ‘Jobs accomplished’ in Iraq?
As honour found a dangerous nexus
With Haliburton, Bush and Texas,
Or justice met her bridge too far
With Assad propped in Syria!
Yet could this capital minded man
Perceive some hidden market plan
So learn his power’s not that great
As price of Rouble starts to shake?
Or will such mathematics see
An even bloodier tragedy?
Yet while the madness rumbles on
There’s one thing still that loves the sun
A graceful polar bear, who stands
On promentories, and icy strands
And watches, with a comic grin,
The human mayhem now begin
No slave to border drawn solutions
That mighty beast of evolutions,
Who in his self refrigeration
Has yet some small determination.
Until he’s wrecked by greed or arson
And emptying shelves – of Mr Larson!
The greatest carnivore by far
Not Rusky, Chechen, Yank nor Tsar
But made of wildest skin and bone
That scion of a dying home
Unstudied in the world reforming
Or all that talk of Global Warming.
You think, dear Putin, you are brave
Enough to wrestle in his cave?!
Or if he clawed your tender skin
The strong man, you could even win,
Except by dint of cold machine
And bullets from a magazine?
But if such beasts are first survival
Their love of cub has human rival
And though we fail, we simply must
Try, time again, to build the just.
A lesson that’s not always best
Told in the compromising West!
While if we should be strong, you’ll find,
The world’s the good we leave behind.
With thoughts of him, or purer frown
Have you the guts to just back down?
And really hold, with love or pain,
The strong arms round a free Ukraine?
Or can’t you see that Iron Fists
Encourage Ultra Nationalists?
So with a sigh, like dying day,
The bear shakes head and turns away
Lifting his paws to swiftly go
With lollop through the melting snow?
DCD
Horrid Heroes and Crazy Crooks is under copyright to Phoenix Ark Press, 2014, All Oil Rights Reserved. If you enjoyed the take on Mr Putin and would like to read about Dick Whittington, Al Capone, Sweeney Todd, or Sherlock Holmes then just follow the blogs below. The cartoon shows a Winter Olympics Mr Putin standing of the brave girls of Pussy Riot and is taken from the internet.
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