‘They are the apes of a sinister jungle and are treated as their grimaces deserve.’ Joseph Conrad
cheap cheap cheap cut cut throttle ring ring, on discount, name your price, this is too dear, four pounds at th’Asda, four fifty here, four fifty four FIFTY, haggle me, won’t conform what is it worth refund me im faulty item, not uniform.
Squeeze us; throttle us, bleeping tills, bleating robots, points on a clubcard, dots in the matrix.
Decency dead.
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Rather dramatic? Sometimes, this retail environment just makes me speechless. People just don’t seem to be able to take that step back from commercialism anymore, they don’t think ‘Hey this till operative, this bag wrapper is actually human’. Humanity is dead, ruled by the pound, the euro, the whatever. You couldn’t think that this is the same human race who evolved from apes; who battled against oppression to live a free life.
Free, that is a laugh when you’re stuck behind a wonky counter trying to imitate a robot on a conveyor belt. The till works at two speeds – slow and suicidal, but it can't protest, it doesn’t have a voice apart from bleeps, it is unconscious – and you hear these price-sensitive folk of Burnley: ‘Ai, this buke is 39p cheaper at th’Asda’ – never mind the fact that th’Asda staff treat a book – yes a book – in the same manner as a 9p tin of beans – oops sorry that is a cliché but hey I’m 19, let me off.
Poundland Wilkinson and TG Hughes carriers filled to the brims with tat,
Armfuls of fruit from the tree for the baby baboons,
You get my point now? These Burnley folk that are slowly sinking into the mire of ape-dom don’t realise that here, here amongst the meagre shelves of this bookshop, escape is possible.
Escape: into the depths of the human universe, the universe itself and the opportunity of truth, inch their downtrodden eyelids from the pavements and the dog shit and see. To transform: billions, trillions of respiring cells into a hungry mentality. To evolve.
Instead, they squander their respiring energies into saving 4p on a packet of cheapo fags and even save their ‘the’s’ ‘an’s’. Not to mention the almost universal absence of politeness markers:
‘’New buke, ‘Stan ‘Man’
‘Could you please tell me about this new book about Stan the Man?’
Occasionally, foreigners, (people from Blackburn and beyond) do visit, probably to spectate on this tragic waste of the tool that makes us human. That’s why I just felt the need, despite the exhaustion of 9 ½ hours of toil, which didn’t even have the romantically physical backdrop of mill wheels – at least they’re powerful - to write. To use the language. To escape.
It must be symbolic that the three major forms of investment that have occurred in recent years here in Burnley are the refurbished Central Library, a motorway now linked to the national system and the futuristic state-of-the-art etc etc bus station. Shame that the buses are driven by apes. Escape – again!
Can I do what I want to do (begins with ‘E’?) In one sense, education meant that I escaped years ago. Unfortunately, I haven’t yet mastered the art of separating mind from body.
After a restless night writing this, I cram down my Asda Good-for-you jam Breville, run for the non-existent bus and plan to gasp yet another mock-asthmatic ‘Sorry!’ at an unworthy jobsworth. At the smashed in bus shelter, complemented by a vista of boarded-up terraced houses lamenting the old, proud regime of self-improvement and struggle of the working class, I observe a gang of labourers from the local ironworks. They buy their daily Sun and dive, like an eagle piercing a churchmouse’s neck, straight into the sports page and Page 3 ‘look at them tits!’ I observe this with a mixture of revulsion, pity and humour; however, not needing to improve, lacking aspiration and ambition, knowing my place – wouldn’t it be bloody easy?
copyright Eric Howard - he he - don't worry it (should) all make sense eventua
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