I was in our works canteen when a call
Came over the tannoy to watch him endorse the new car.
As he bent and touched it, he said:
"This product will save your area
For another decade: it will be loved
Equally by US management
And families whom its air-cooled rear engine
Will power to school. I'm saying this
That you may take pride in your work."
Nervous execs whooshed him away
For a photo session.
I lost my job
In the first redundancies.
'Does the daffodil have an income allocation model ?
Will the company keep you safe
In a world downturn ? Will you see this factory levelled ?'
Hillmans have long gone out of production.
My launch brochures in a box upstairs
With his photo are greeny with damp.
We did good work, though. No regrets.
It was true what he said, standing up
On a platform in Linwood, Scotland,
Endorsing the new Hillman Imp.
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The Imp Site
Imp History Linwood |
© Franka |
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The Scottish Invention of English Literature / Robert Crawford. - Cambridge University, 1998
The penguin Book of Poetry from Britain & Ireland since 1945 / Simon Armitage & Robert Crawford (eds). - Penguin, 1998
Robert Burns and Cultural Authority / Robert Crawford (ed). - University of Iowa, 1997. - 335 p. ; 0.98" x 9.51" x 6.33"
Identifying Poets : Self and Territory in Twentieth-Century Poetry
/ Robert Crawford. - Edinburgh University, January 1994
Liz Lochhead's Voices / Robert Crawford and Anne Varty (eds). - Edinburgh University, 1993. - (Modern Scottish Writers)
Reading Douglas Dunn / Robert Crawford and David. Kinloch (eds). - Polygon, 1982; Edinburgh University, 1992 The Arts of Alasdair Gray / Robert Crawford and Thom Nairn (eds). - Edinburgh University, September 1991. - (Modern Scottish Writers)
About Edwin Morgan / Robert Crawford and Hamish Whyte (eds). - Edinburgh University, November 1990
Devolving English Literature / Robert Crawford. - Clarendon Pr, 1992. - 320 p. ;0.82 x 8.49 x 5.48"
Savage and the City in the Work of T S Eliot / Robert Crawford. - Clarendon, 1988. - (Oxford English Monographs)
Talking Verse : interviews with poets / Robert Crawford et al (eds) |
Publishing this poem here is a breach of copyright.
I haven't figured out yet whom to ask for permission. Hopefully I'll be excused until then. Doing a quick web search on on COPAC and Amazon shows that there's definitely more than one Robert Crawford doing some serious authoring. And there seem to be more than one who may have the above verse to his name.
For instance, there is a Dr Robert Crawford at the University of St Andrews, who has something to do with poetry...
It seems a bit presumptious to ask him if he is responsible for the Linwood factory worker's poem... He may have thought so, too, as he hasn't answered my e-mails.
Mind you, I rather like it. A lot. Surely no one would get disagreeable if they were asked did they write it?
The Mr. Crawford, who has been busy with the books to the right, seems to have visited any university but St. Andrews... so perhaps it's not the same person
And the Crawford with the most recent published poetry uses a London publisher... The third man ?
I'm thinking that the author of the older work, published in the 60s, maybe my best bet.
Maybe I should check the guy who wrote "The Devil's Carousel". Chances are he's an actual Linwood factory man ?
"Robert Crawford is a scrupulously exact composer and individual. He agonises over every note in his small output of outstanding chamber music."
If this is the Mr. Crawford who holds the copyright, I'm probably in trouble when he finds out about this page...
Masculinity / Robert Crawford. - London : Jonathan Cape, 1997; Cape Poetry, 1996. - 68 p ; 20 cm
ISBN 0224043714 (pbk)
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 1,029,012
Contraflow on the super highway : poems by Robert Crawford [et al] / edited by W. N. Herbert and Richard Price. 1994
A Scottish Assembly / Robert Crawford. - London : Chatto & Windus, 1992
ISBN: 0701135956 (pbk)
Talkies / Robert Crawford. - London : Chatto & Windus, 1992. - [80]p ; 22cm
ISBN: 0701139285 (pbk)
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 1,346,397
Chatto poetry festival / Robert Crawford [et al.]. 1989
But I'm Only a Social Drinker / Robert Crawford
ASIN: 0723307547 ; This title is out of print.
Alcoholism
The Shroud Society / Robert Crawford. - Black Dagger Crime, 1997
ISBN 0745186203 (Hardcover)
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 1,343,056
Mystery & Detective - Traditional British
The Scottish Invention of English Literature
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Young & free : letters of Robert and Thomas Crawford, 1821-1830 / Robert Crawford
ASIN: 0646253557 ; This title is out of print.
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 988,690
Pioneers Australia
Studying American Music / R. Crawford. - Inst for Studies in Amer Music, 1985
ISBN: 0914678256 (pbk)
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 902,644
The badger's daughter / Crawford, Robert. 1971
Cockleburr / Crawford, Robert. 1969
The blathrie air o't / Crawford, Robert. 1965
The brisk young lad / Crawford, Robert. 1965
A ballad and other poems / Crawford, Robert, 1877-. 1925
Across the Pampas and the Andes / Crawford, Robert. 1884
Cultural affections of the ischio-rectal fossa. / Crawford, Robert. ;-)