The Poetry Of: Spandau Ballet

A series written by our literature reporter, Hammy, who combines a love of fine poetry with a total inability to realise that most pop lyrics are total shite. 

Diamond, Gary Kemp

Chrysalis Records (London) 1982

Mr. Kemp’s collection Diamond finds the poet in a refreshingly unfathomable mood.  Perhaps the most intriguing piece is called Innocence and Science.  The opening stanza sets the scene.

Water from my mind

breaks the rope and binds

water comes from inside

and frees me

innocence and science

I think that we can all agree that this is about making an omelette.  Or perhaps Proust.  Or perhaps some kind of sex game in the bathroom.  The startling opening image suggests that Gary’s brain is dribbling in some way.  Gary’s brain dribble is able to break the metaphorical ropes and free him from the leaking faucet located somewhere in his body.  Innocence and science.

Metal sings my name

poisoned love sustained

metal breaks me inside

and frees me

innocence and science

I will never forget

Neither will I Gary.  This is truly unforgettable.  In any case, it appears that he is grateful to his surgeon for removing the rusty tap he got stuck up his bottom.

Another poem called She Loved Like Diamond also dabbles in mystery and nonsense.

She ran the risk from unity

obsession dies alone with tragedy

she loved like diamond

and cut so hard

she died

Putting the meaning of these lyrics to one side for a moment (perhaps locked in your neighbour’s basement), I would like to draw attention to what Mr. Kemp is doing here.  He is at play with language.  Not for him conventional sentences that are coherent and follow the rules of grammar.

A passion course that leads to pain

an acid taste that laced her soul again

Exactly.

Reminds me of the time I took a passion course at university.  Man that acid taste laced my soul real bad.

But let’s end with Instinction.  Yes, instinction.

You cry, justify

but deep beneath the feelings lie

photo, looking old

memory makes the day feel cold

they’ve gone, sing your song

walk the flow, oh, too slow

post boom, second doom

stealing cake to eat the moon

Extended metaphor for irresponsible financial speculation.  That’s what I’m going for.  You know, the raw instinction of the trading room, the boom and bust, the stealing of cake to, um, eat the… er, moon.

Extraordinary.

Drinks in New Delhi

After a lot of bullying I managed to get Jean-Paul cleaned up, out of his shabby little room, and across town to my hotel.

I bought him a drink in one of the hotel bars.  The bar was mostly deserted and hushed, the far away sound of innocuous jazz, creamy white walls, palms, and wood-framed furniture with plump cushions.  When I put the drink down in front of him, Jean-Paul wasted no time.

“I don’t think it’s fair that I’ve been fired.”

“Perhaps, but it has happened.”

“What exactly was their reason?”

“You’re pretentious.”

“Pretentious?” He took quite a large gulp at his drink.

“Yes, pretentious.  You fancy yourself as a bit of an intellectual, but you aren’t and it shows.  Worse, it shows in a very boring and put on way.”

He took another large gulp.

“I present your Masters thesis as evidence.” I put it on the coffee table between us.  About 120 A4 sheets.

He looked surprised and then discomfited.  “How on earth did you get that?”

“I’m fictional remember, I can do anything.”

He regarded me they way people regard all unfathomable interlopers: with suspicion.  I began to read from the first page of his thesis:

“In Strategies of State and Political Plays Tennenhouse suggests that the conventional notion of artistic genres is unworkable, that Elizabethan and Jacobean literary forms ‘resemble contemporaneous strategies of political augmentation more that they resemble each other.’  “

I put the page back with the others.

After a while Jean-Paul did the only decent thing and apologised.

“What on earth made you write like that?” I asked.

He shook his head, “I don’t know.  I thought I was being clever.”

“And you’re still guilty of it.  Who cares about your imaginary literary travels around the world reading books no one has heard of or will ever read?”

“The Singapore book was ok.”

“Ok? Don’t set the bar too high. Can you tell me why you chose to read Tagore when you came to India?”

“Tell me three famous Indian writers.”

“Rushdie, Roy, Desai.”

“All English.”

“What?”

“They all write in English.”

“So?”

“I thought it was interesting that all of the famous Indian writers we know in the West write in English, and I thought that there must be famous Indian writers who don’t.”

I had to admit that this was slightly interesting.  “Are there?”

“Yes, of course, but Tagore was the only one I could find who had been translated into English.  He won the Nobel prize for Literature.  He’s like a Shakespeare in Bengali.”

“Any good in English?”

“Oh yes, he’s wonderful.  Wonderful.”

“Well, I’ll have to go and meet him then.”

A flicker of derision passed across Jean-Paul’s face.  “He died  a long, long time ago I’m afraid.”

“Oh, that’s no problem.”

“Because you’re fictional?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

A waiter came across to see if we wanted some more drinks.  As I had an imaginary gold card I ordered us some champagne.  After it arrived Jean-Paul turned to me again.

“What will you ask him?”

“I have stock questions.”

“Stock questions?”

“Yes, you know, the kind of thing you find at the back of lifestyle magazines – ten questions with celebrity x – that sort of line.  ‘If you were a pop song what kind would you be’, that kind of thing.”

Jean-Paul looked at me quite steadily, and then stood up and left.  I watched him walk across the bar and under the high arch of the entrance with mixed feelings and a glass of Veuve.

My name is Hamish

I found Jean-Paul stretched across a sordid looking camp bed in a hostel in New Delhi.  He hardly stirred when I came in.  A pedastal fan was labouring to blow the hot air in the close room from one side to the other.  I think it was the smell from my cigar smoke that roused him.  He regarded me feebly from his bed, and after licking his lips, spoke in a voice that sounded like a scratched vinyl record.

“How can you bear to wear a suit and tie in this climate?” he asked.

“I’m fictional.”

He licked at his lips again, and sighed.

“Fictional?” he said eventually.

“Yes. Like you.”

“Non-fiction.”

“Sorry?”

“I’m non-fiction. In a non-fiction world.”

I don’t like to humiliate a man when he’s down.  “If you say so,” I said.

I went and got some water from one of the bottles he had on the floor near his head.  There was a chipped enamel cup which I tried to clean out with my hanky before I poured him a glass and handed it to him.  He drank it slowly, propped up on an elbow, and thanked me.  There was plenty of time to listen to the fan, and the endless street noise so we did.

“Why are you here?” he asked.

“Man of Errors sent me.”

“Why?”

“You’re supposed to be on an exciting whirlwind tour of the world reading exotic books and filing witty reports.”

I could see him steeling himself for the next part so I said it.

“But instead you’ve been to Brisbane and Singapore and read two dumb books.”

“They weren’t dumb.”

“Then you made them sound dumb.”

He began to sulk, but there wasn’t any point in being nice about it.  I had read his last two reviews and they were drivel.  Jean-Paul flopped back on his camp bed and rolled over to face the wall.  I carried on.

“Anyway, you’ve been fired.”

No reaction.

“I’m taking over.”

No reaction.

“What have you been reading in India?”

He mumbled something, and waved his arm vaguely at the other side of the room.  I found a book on the floor.  There was a man on the cover with an enormous beard.  The cover of the book said Rabindranath Tagore, I Won’t Let You Go, Selected Poems.

I took a long moment over my cigar and looked at Jean-Paul’s back, and then summarised the situation as far as I saw it.

“God, you’re such a dick,” I said.