Minister for Health Simon Harris
Slither
The day you slithered from the womb
the Doctor held you aloft, confirmed what we’d feared:
“Madam, it’s a potential Minister for Health.” And newborn you
screamed what we later understood to mean:
“bring me your perforated eardrums, your infected
urinary tracts, and I will set up a committee to look in them.”
But this most recent birth wasn’t the beginning.
Since shortly before time officially began,
you’ve dragged yourself across the top soil.
You were present and correct to brush the dandruff
off the Lord Mayor’s hat each time he visited
the municipal Home for Unfortunate Women
whose babies had to be flogged
to couples named Barbara and Algernon,
so as to be prudent with the Parish’s pennies.
You were on hand to personally present
the late archbishop with his fifth chocolate biscuit,
last time he visited the much maligned
School for The Blind, which used to be
where the town abattoir now stands.
And it was written
in lines later deleted from the Book of Judges
that it would be you who’d flood
our hospitals with avant-garde urologists
who instead of the traditional
(and far more costly) balloon catheter,
and ultrasonic stone disintegration apparatus,
prefer more radical treatments involving
a fishing rod and an electric hair straightener.
Your upcoming marriage the usual
confidence and supply arrangement
you’ve had every other century.
Your fingers are starving worms
patiently awaiting their moment.
Kevin Higgins
Rollingnews
Previously: Kevin Higgins on Broadsheet
Jaysus that first line is poison though. proper hate
+1
It’s a strange sentiment, that simply by becoming minister for health you are filth.
If the authors favourite politician somehow became minister for health, I wonder would all of the above still apply? Maybe it’s just a useful justification for spitting abuse guilt free.
Couldn’t go further. Quite sickly reading ‘ The day you slithered from the womb’ as if it was a dark event recorded in time or something. Some people take politics way too seriously.
“Some people take politics way too seriously.”
It’s true… I genuinely can’t imagine getting myself that worked up over someone whose politics weren’t actual Nazism or ISIS or something… Certainly not run-of-the-mill Christian Democrats or socialists or what have you.
Even Hitler didn’t slither out of a womb ffs.
He goose-stepped out holding a finger under his nose to indicate a mustache because he was too young for facial hair.
Not a fan of Harris but this is a vicious ad-hominem attack. And really bad doggerel.
Yeah. And I really really am not a fan of Harris.
It felt rather unnecessarily vitriolic.
That really felt like you’re dehumanising him. Really vicious… don’t think anyone deserves that.
This reads like it was written in a wooden cabin in a remote forest
Wow. As Umberto Eco said: “All poets write bad poems. Good poets burn them. Bad poets publish them.” You can guess what I think of this. Utter doggerel, as well as nasty.
as i learned from the new Neil Gaiman book, bad poets have drunk of the mead that bird-Odin shat in the face of an eagle
I’ve said it before that I think Harris has all the look and charm of a minor Dickens-written lickspittle but this? You can blame him for plenty but he’s not unique among Ministers for Health; the fact is that the Service is knackered and needs the kind of root and branch reform that, I suspect, the country simply isn’t ready to accept.
Isn’t it? A decent national health service paid for by national insurance contributions probably less than what people are currently paying to private health insurers? I think we’d say yes to that.
Only a maniac would refuse that (or an FG Fanboy).
Brilliant stuff Kevin.
Long may it continue!
You don’t have to be so nasty all the time dav
Drivel.
I would have thought that the people who post this kind of nonsense as considered political analysis would have paused and reflected on where it might bring us as a culture by now, one only has to look to our neighbours east and west to see what happens when you debase political discourse
+ Jo Cox
How dare you.
The poet does not mention Simon Harris.
Hmmm…
He did post a picture of Simon Harris on the tweets promoting the poem; you can click the link above and see.
Fair enough. It’s not just about Harris though.
But this most recent birth wasn’t the beginning.
Since shortly before time officially began,
you’ve dragged yourself across the top soil.
And I’ve said just that above. Or at least that he’s not solely to blame.
Putting his picture in his tweets makes it personal.
True. Bad move.
Simon is the “egg”, your FG voting neighbor is the “chicken”. Or did the russians rig last two elections? They probably manipulated Tusla records too.
This was originally published on Clare Daly’s website – and, according to the poet, “commissioned” by her. If true, I’d find that a little disappointing. And surprising.
sorry, I misread that – not commissioned by her
but, yes, published on her website under heading “FG leadership contest heats up”
that is disappointing
I wouldn’t be either surprised or disappointed
Yeah. What people above fail to note is that Broadsheet made an editorial decision to publish this.
My previous comments re Kevin Higgins continue to apply:
“Fast forward 500 years. Aliens land on Earth. They want to see an example of narcissism and bitter hatred from the 2000s.
Recommendation: just study the poetry and general behaviour of Galway’s chief whinger Kevin Higgins.”
“More petulant whining from Galway’s chief narcissist Kevin Higgins. His arty mates will lap it up but the rest of us can spot the bitterness and hatred a mile away.”
Wow it was even better this time Peter
Do it again!
haha
It sounds to me as if he got a kidney stone lodged in his ureter and the removal was unexpectedly painful, and he’s sore about it
PS: what happened to the McMansions thing?
An’ye were giving out about me!!!!
That’s stuff’s seriously deranged
Well that was like reading a surly,15 year old, spotty Patrick Kavanagh- backwards.
I concur re the above kidney stone comment
There’s a fine line between holding people accountable and criticisng them, and personalising things to the point of completely losing sight of the problem behind the monstrous dehumanised caricature you’ve erected and actually it’s not a fine line at all it’s a very big and obvious mile-high fence and this barges through it and runs off gibbering over the edge of the cliff.
Couldn’t you have just said “it’s crap “?
You can say it if you like.
Thanks but don’t want to get modded off for banter again
It’s crap.
There. Tis done.
I like your new haircut Milly
Well said!
+1 Gorgeous mane, Mildred.
You need help mate. Talk to your G.P
Feck sake lads and lassies, you’d think it was Kevin’s idea for Harris to be the living embodiment of the words “oily creep”.
The poem got a laugh out of me.
Diplomacy is for diplomats. The rest of us are fully entitled to go to town and political crawlers and let the pearl-clutchers be damned.