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Rivers of blood.
Rivers of blood.
Throwing a match on gunpowder,
Then watching it burn.
The axis of politics
Was starting to turn.
The fire it was well started
And raced just like a flood.
A warning that was preached,
Called, '"'The rivers of blood.'"'
The twentieth of April
Nineteen sixty-eight
The date that Enoch Powell,
He opened the sluice gate.
He predicated a stark warning
That within a certain span
That Blacks would hold the whip
Above the poor White man.
Powell he quoted letters
From ordinary working folk
Who felt that this fine Country
Was nothing but a joke..
He advocated re-emigration
With grants, and of course assistance.
To help the Blacks back home,
Finally keep their distance.
'"'As I look ahead.'"' he said
'"'I am filled with much foreboding.'"'
He knew that this great country
Was at risk of just imploding.
He quoted from the Sibyl
An epic poem of words
'"'that saw the river Tiber
Foaming with much blood.'"'
Now those within that function suite,
Hardly anyone disagreed,
Perhaps they thought that Powell
Was the man to set them free.
But within his Shadow Cabinet
You should have heard the screech
They wanted Powell removed,
Him and that damned speech.
Edward Heath he had no option
He gave the man the sack.
It was a Sunday evening
There was no going back.
Some on the far right
Put forward their dislike,
And a thousand east end Dockers
They even went on strike.
They carried lots of placards
And the words that they had written
Said, '"'don"'"t knock Enoch.'"'
'"'back Britain, not black Britain.'"'
Some Mps they were abused
They needed some protection,
The Dockers let them know
'"'bring on the next Election.'"'
Then Gallup took a poll
And the Country had to heed
For seventy-four percent,
Said, '"'he"'"s right.'"' and just agreed.
He died in ninety-eight
At the age of eighty-five
His thoughts still controversial
And yet they still do thrive.
Was he just a racist?
A man to cause division,
Or someone seeing truth
A man that had a vision.
I find it very hard
To make up my own mind,
History is history
But none of us is blind.
I think I love this world
And all that live within it.
But like a cheap jigsaw,
Do we really fit?
Now I only came across this recently and have to say it is quite controversial.
Now I have to state I am in no way a racist it is just a subject matter I felt I wanted to cover.
Here are two stanzas that missed the cut.
The who ha that then followed
left him covered in thick mud,
thrown up from the bottom
of a river foaming blood.
Grinning piccaninnies who
only knew one English word,
who would never see the Tiber
foaming with much blood.
