ABC WEDNESDAY
RUPERT BEAR
What have they done to Rupert Bear?
He was once so debonaire!
Always tidy, always neat,
But very fast on his booted feet.
His body was that of a little boy;
He never seemed like your average toy.
His hands were not those of a bear;
And he had human clothes to wear.
A teddy-bear head on a human frame,
But quite believable all the same.
At least one child, and that was me,
Was a besotted devotee.
Words can't describe my happiness
When Daddy got the Daily Express,
And my special page was given to me
So that I could 'read' him avidly.
What adventures that Rupert had!
But his reincarnation makes me sad.
Oh dear! Oh dear! What is this?
He's had a metamorphosis!
They've turned him into a sort of blob.
The scarf remains; a jolly good job!
But he's lost that special Rupert look!
He's any old bear from any old book!
And if he's 'cartooned' (perish the thought)
His adventures will be of a different sort.
He'll fight with demons and whizz through space
And become invisible! What a disgrace!
His adventures used to be
The sort that could happen to little me.
What have they done to Ruper Bear!
I'm the only person who seems to care!
*
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BLACK.
Trees, when they shed their leaves
Create their own memorials.
No chiselled platitudes:
'Died, September 1950:
Resurrected April 1951'
No heavy angelic carving,
No stiff unbending stone trees,
Lowering over the dear departed.
No representations of leaves
Falling eternally
Like tears.
But a tracery of denuded branches,
Stark against the winter sky;
Arms raised gracefully,
Pleading for the sun.
*
So it is, sometimes,
With gutted buildings.
They accidentally invent
Memorials
More moving
Than any stone-smith could create.
The destruction of the Twin Towers
Called forth
Twisted metal
That was both elegant and archaic.
*
So it is with Brighton Pier.
Did I really walk its boards
When both of us were young?
Was there really colour, noise,
Funny hats, icecream,
Youth?
Brighton Pier has attained
A grace in death
That it never revealed in life.
The flames purified it
And turned it into
A work of art.
*
