To the Lukewarm

'So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth'.- Revelation 3:16

by Christopher Norris, with image by Martin Gollan

Let hate, like love, burn steady, fierce and clean.
No time for cooling passions – keep your flame
Turned up, spot on: oxyacetylene!

Try this: the man has lied, shifted the blame
To hapless functionaries, fled the scene
Of every crime before some reckoner came

To call him out, obstructed justice, been
Lead player in each tabloid-sponsored game
Of rabble-rousing, skulked behind a screen

Of bluff and bluster when a one-time tame
Investigator spilled the final bean
On some new crime-in office, staked his claim

To rank with Nero in the epicene
Dictator league, got press-hounds to defame
A judge or two, rejoiced to vent his spleen

On those reporters rash enough to name
A host of scattered offspring or umpteen
Past mistresses, let slip that his chief aim

Was scrapping any pesky law they’d frame
To oust him, have the Met latch on he’s keen
To hush their findings up, revealed that shame

Or honour have no place in the latrine
Of quick-flush conscience, and displayed the same
Old Eton-bred contempt that’s let them preen

Themselves, those would-be monarchs, on their fame
For all things bad, like this one and his queen
Whose sins, Macbeth-like, darken each je t’aime.