The tired monkey grinds out the national anthem for the millionth time. A few drunks stand, their red faces bland and beaming, their red caps crushed in emotional fists, but most of us barely register it anymore, and carry on working with different songs buzzing in our throats. I’m building a house out of paper and light, with stained glass windows of secular saints: in the front door is William Morris, shaggy and blustering as he wrestles with the intractable conundrum of art for the masses; and in the attic skylight is wiry Woody Guthrie, levelling the field with a battered Martin. This land is your land, this land is my land, and that one over there isn’t. It’s time to dismantle the elaborate machinery of violence and fraud. My house will have doors always open, soft beds and succour for those who wander dazed. If only that monkey would learn a different tune.
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Oz Hardwick
Picture Nick Victor
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