My night with Johnny Jacobs

In a remote Canadian dump

Was a cool little bar,

An Italian turned Irish joint.

We had a pint,

Then another pint,

Then another.

My friend was wrapped up in someone else, and that’s

when Johnny Jacobs came

about and spoke –

Sympathized about the Mexicans plight,

Bought us all blueberry Vodka shots

I took the shot,

Though I hate Vodka.

Long (and boring) story short

at his house

Across from the cool little bar

In the remote Canadian dump

He gave me smokes

And profoundly sad

conversation on the porch.

We oddly connected,

though we couldn’t have been more far apart.

He asked me to bed,

I said “no,”

He drunkenly moaned, “but you’re so cute!”

I laughed. An empty tinkling sound.

“It wouldn’t have worked out anyways,” he mumbled.

He kicked us out, with a drunken exchange of numbers.

We stumbled to a taxi in the evening light,

I flew home the next day.

Johnny Jacobs stayed behind

In the remote Canadian dump,

buying blueberry vodka shots,

Forgotten – save for a poem.

11/2011

The Testimony of Patience Kershaw

I was researching hurriers – an early 19th century coal thruster recently.

Women and children were mostly employed to do these jobs due to the unbelievably small size of the roadways, and their job was to transport the coal that had been mined. The work was unfit for any person, no less children, and the shifts could be 12 hours in length. Very sad.

The Unthanks perform this song written by Frank Higgins and it conveys the testimony by Patience Kershaw, one such worker, to the Children’s Employment Commission.

A really lovely song, though! I find it haunting and sad, and her voice is striking.

What say you?