It’s like History on Acid,
A Raphael Samuel Magical Mystery Tour,
Not Seven Rooms of Gloom,
But ten rooms which haunt and hex:
The dead still alive,
Watching us trip through space and time,
Jonathan Wild and Jack Sheppard outside,
Peering through the window panes,
Observing us in our candle-lit dream,
Clocks ticking away the century
Until it’s the time for Jacob Marley
To make his visitation and warning,
Not just to Ebenezer Scrooge,
But to us,
As well as the occupants:
The half real, half fictive Jervis family;
Marley’s chains rattle across the garret floorboards,
Church bells toll through the London particular –
Beyond Folgate Street, in Spitalfields
Beggars still line the streets,
Charity breakfasts are organised
For London school kids,
Scrooge is unredeemed,
Scheming in his City counting houses.
The Jervis family open the door,
Observe this millennial world,
Shake their heads in despairing disbelief,
And quickly return to their hearthside:
‘You either see it, or you don’t.’