Taken from 'Poetry versus Orchestra'. Album by Hollie and Metropole Orkest, conducted by Jules Buckley.
Released on MO Black, fall 2016.
www.mo.nl/poetry • www.holliepoetry.com
Poem written by Hollie McNish, music by Jules Buckley
Artwork by me studio, Martin Pyper
iTunes: itunes.apple.c...
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Executive producer: Marc Altink • Producer: Jules Buckley • Co-producer: Chris Wheeler • Recording engineer and mixing: Jonathan Allen • Mastering: Yoad Nevo at Nevo Sound Studios • Recording assistent: Dirk Overeem
Special thanks to Kwame Kwaten and Jonny from Ferocious Talent!
MATHEMATICS
he said
“those goddamn pakistanis and their goddamn corner shops
built a shop on every corner, took our british workers jobs”
he said
“those goddamn chinese and their goddamn china shops”
i told him they’re from vietnam, but he didn’t give a toss
i ask him what was there before that “damn japan man’s shop?”
he looks at me and dreams a scene of british workers’ jobs
of full-time, full-employment before the “goddamn boats all came”
where everybody went to work for full-time full-hours every day
“a british business stood their first”
he claims
“before the irish came
now british people lost their jobs and bloody turkish they're to blame”
i ask him how he knows that fact, he says, “because it’s true”
i ask him how he knows it’s fact, he says, he read it in the news,
“every time a somali comes here they take a job from us
the mathematics one for one, from us to them, it just adds up.”
he bites his cake, he sips his brew, he says again he knows the plot
“the goddamn caribbean’s came and now good folk here don’t have jobs”
i ask him what was there before the “goddamn persian curtain shop”
i show him architectures’ plans
of empty goddamn plots of land
I show him the historic maps
a bit of sand
a barren land
there was no goddamn shop before that pakistani came and planned
man - i am sick of crappy mathematics
cos i love a bit of sums
i spent years into economics
and i geek out over calculus
and when i meet these paper claims
that one of every new that came
takes away ‘our’ daily wage
i desperately want to scream
“your math is stuck-in primary”
cos some who come here also spend
and some who come here also lend
and some who come here also tend
to set up work which employs them
and all thosebalance sheets and trends
they work with numbers, not with men
and all this goddamn heated talk
ignores the trade the polish brought
ignores the men they give work to
not plumbing jobs but further too
ignores the guys they buy stock from
accountants, builders, on and on
and i know it’s nice to have someone
to blame our lack of jobs upon
but immigration’s not that plain
despite the sums inside our brains
as one for one
as him for you
as if he goes ‘home’, they’d employ you
cos sometimes one that comes makes two
and sometimes one can add three more
and sometimes two times two is much, much more than four
and most times immigrants bring more than minuses.