Poets4Corbyn: Jeremy Corbyn is immortalised in rhyme

If you thought Corbynmania was limited to female obsession and male politicians growing their facial hair, it’s time to think again. It turns out that Jeremy Corbyn is also inspiring poets everywhere.

Steerpike has been sent a copy of a new collection of poems edited by Russell Bennetts, which includes poems by 22 authors who have been inspired by the man of the moment. Among the array of rhymes (and half-rhymes) on offer are poems titled ‘The seven ages of a Labour MP’, ‘unelectable’ and ‘Wongawongaland’. 

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Nicholas Murray’s ‘J.C.’ offers an insight into why Corbyn is so popular:

Corbyn’s no knight in shining vest,
or bright Messiah from the West (he’d say)
but someone who has found a way to voice a fractured country’s need for choice,
to say we’ll make another kind of noise: No way!

However, Mr S’s favourite poem is Erik Kennedy’s catchily titled ‘Growing Fears That the Leadership Contest Has Been Hijacked by Far-Left Infiltrators’, which also doubles up as a test for whether you are a real socialist:

If you think that spiny lobsters should own
the spiny lobster migration paths
and not some groaning sea-god who licenses his image
for use in tuna ads and myths,

and if you believe a turtle shell
with dozens
of turtles trying to get in,
crying ‘We’re all in it together,’
is what the world will look like in about 2029,

and if the chambered nautilus to you
represents a way of coping
with a repeated loss of home
instead of a ropey scheme
for having loads of extra bedrooms,

and if in your entire life
you’ve had
no-one to identify with
who wasn’t first and last
a danger to the good
through well-meaning compromise,

if you can agree to this,
resignedly but definitely,
you might be a socialist.