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    A Christmas Carol: A Poem
    A Christmas Carol: A Poem
    A Christmas Carol: A Poem
    Ebook120 pages1 hour

    A Christmas Carol: A Poem

    By Bez Berry

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    About this ebook

    A narrative poem based on the original by Charles Dickens
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBookBaby
    Release dateOct 31, 2014
    ISBN9781483542331
    A Christmas Carol: A Poem

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      Book preview

      A Christmas Carol - Bez Berry

      9781483542331

      Stave 1

      Marley's Ghost

      Marley was dead to begin with. There's no uncertainty.

      The register of burial was signed for all to see

      By those who had no interest like the clergyman and clerk.

      The undertaker signed his name. Scrooge too had made his mark.

      Scrooge signed it. Scrooge's name was good if money was exchanged.

      The documents were signed and sealed; the burial arranged.

      Marley was dead as a door-nail. His body in a cask.

      Mind for my own poor knowledge I feel that I have to ask

      Why we are so precise about a door-nail being dead.

      I might have been inclined to use 'a coffin-nail' instead,

      The deadest piece of ironmongery for a simile.

      The wisdom of our ancestors is good enough for me

      And my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it from its seat

      Or the good Country's done for. So, permit me to repeat

      Emphatically, that Marley was as dead as he could be

      Like the proverbial doornail and for all eternity.

      Scrooge knew Marley was dead of course. He knew it for a fact.

      How could it be otherwise? He knew he had to act

      As his sole executor, his sole administrator,

      His sole witness, his sole beneficiary and later,

      As his sole friend, he was the only mourner at the grave

      And Scrooge, the businessman, he knew just how he must behave.

      Not dreadfully cut up or saddened by this grave event

      But as a man of business. On the funeral day he spent

      Some time in making bargains and all solemnised no doubt

      With promissory notes that he had checked three times throughout.

      His funeral now brings me back to all the things I've said,

      Back to the point I started from. There's no doubt he was dead.

      Nothing can come that's wonderful from all that I'll relate.

      If it's not clearly understood that Marley'd met his fate.

      If we're not perfectly convinced that Hamlet's father died

      Before the tragedy began, then how could we decide

      If something was remarkable in his taking a stroll

      When walking on his ramparts, on a night as black as coal,

      In such a bitter eastern wind, or so the story ran,

      Than there would be in any other portly gentleman

      Impetuously turning out upon a breezy spot --

      (Saint Paul's old Churchyard is just one example I have got).

      To astonish his son's weak mind and fill him full of dread.

      So it is irrefutable that Jacob Marley's dead!

      Scrooge never painted out Old Marley's name above the door

      And there it stood, years afterwards, above the warehouse for

      The firm was known as 'Scrooge and Marley.' Sometimes people who

      Were new to business called him Scrooge, some called him Marley too.

      He answered to both names for it was all the same to him.

      So call him Scrooge or Marley the response would be still be grim.

      And at the grindstone, he was mean, like flint so sharp and hard.

      A squeezing, wrenching, grasping man with total disregard

      For others who lived harder lives for money was his god.

      His life was ruled by business and he didn't think this odd.

      A scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner, he'd conspire

      To ensure that from his grindstone no steel would strike a fire

      Of generosity. He had a cold, tight fisted hand.

      So secret, self-contained and like an oyster in the sand

      Was solitary and the cold within him froze his face.

      It nipped his pointed nose, his shrivelled cheeks it would embrace.

      With stiffened gait and rheumy eyes, his thin lips cold and blue

      His grating voice would set your teeth on edge and pierce you through.

      Upon his head and eyebrows and on his lean, wiry chin.

      A frosty rime was present. His gnarled face was strained and thin.

      His own low temperature - he always carried it about.

      He iced his office in the dog-days and there was no doubt

      At Christmas time he didn't thaw. No, not by one degree.

      External heat and cold had little influence you see.

      No warmth could ever warm him and no wintry weather chill.

      No wind that blew was bitterer than he and there's more still;

      No falling winter snow was more intent upon its goal,

      No pelting rain less open to entreaty. On the whole

      Foul weather really didn't know just where to have him best.

      The heaviest rain and snow and hail and sleet and all the rest

      Could boast advantage over him in only one respect.

      They often came down handsomely, Scrooge never did. Except. . .

      No! There are no exceptions. No one stopped him in the street

      To wish him well. No vagrants begged a trifle at his feet.

      Nobody ever stopped him in the town with gladsome looks,

      To say 'Dear Scrooge, how are you? Now why don't you leave your books

      And come to see me, do my friend.' No one enquired the way.

      No child asked Scrooge what time it was and it is sad to say

      Even the blind men's dogs appeared to know him very well

      And when they saw him coming on, his foul mood they could tell.

      They'd tug their owners through a door into a darkened court

      And then would wag their ragged tails as if they'd had the thought;

      'No eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!

      If we're heading home I think we really should walk faster.'

      Did Scrooge care? Not a bit. He liked to edge his way along

      The densely crowded paths of life while warning all the throng

      To keep their distance from him and to leave him well alone.

      He'd growl and snap and sneer and snarl and mock, complain and moan.

      But once upon a time - of all the good days in the year,

      Old Scrooge was in his counting house and looking quite austere.

      No cheer was in the dark, cold room and this was Christmas Eve.

      'Twas bleak and cold and biting, almost too cold to conceive.

      The people in the court outside went wheezing up and down

      Stamping their feet upon the stones to warm them on the ground.

      It was quite dark already, though the clocks had just struck three.

      There'd been no light throughout the day. It was quite hard to see.

      The damp fog had been pouring in through keyhole and through chink,

      So dense without it made the people wipe their eyes and blink.

      It made the houses in the yard look like some ghostly form

      The low grey mist had covered all and nowhere here felt warm.

      Obscuring all, the dingy, dank grey clouds came drooping down,

      One might have thought that Nature lived hard by in the old town

      And was brewing on a larger scale weather damp and cold

      That made folk’s very bones feel blasted, brittle, sharp and old.

      The door of Scrooge's counting house was open. He could tell

      That his poor clerk was working in his dismal little cell.

      In his dim, squalid tank the clerk was scratching like a mole.

      His fire was very small. It looked like just one piece of coal.

      Though Scrooge's fire was minuscule the clerk's was smaller still

      But he could not replenish it, 'twas Scrooge who paid the bill.

      Scrooge kept the coal box in his room so when the clerk came in

      He made the man feel very small as though it were a sin

      To bring his shovel in the room. His master's words would smart.

      Scrooge loud and gruffly would predict that they'd soon have to part.

      And so the clerk returned and put his comforter back on.

      He tried to use the candle flame to gain some warmth but none

      Of the heat could touch his soul. He had no expectation.

      This endeavour did require a strong imagination.

      *

      'A merry Christmas, Uncle!' a most cheerful voice cried out.

      It was the sound of Scrooge's nephew, which had come about

      So unexpectedly that Scrooge was taken by surprise.

      'Bah! Humbug! Scrooge cried in reply, resentment in his eyes.

      'A Merry Christmas Uncle and God save you!' Fred announced

      But Scrooge was angry with the boy and on his words he pounced.

      'Bah! Humbug!' snarled his uncle with his eyebrows bent so low.

      His nephew's face was ruddy, handsome; cheeks and eyes aglow.

      His breath smoked in the frosty air. He spoke to him again.

      'Christmas a humbug Uncle? What cause have you to complain?'

      'Now why should you be merry? You are poor enough I'm sure.'

      'And you are rich,' young Fred replied, 'You couldn't want for more.'

      Scrooge had no ready answer at that moment and again,

      'Bah! Humbug! spat he back and kept repeating the refrain.

      'There is no reason to be cross.' Fred's voice was clear and strong.

      He waited for a sharp reply. It did not take Scrooge long.

      'What else can I be?' Scrooge replied, 'And where do I begin?'

      He looked at Fred in anger. He had got under his skin.

      'I live in such a world of fools - so out with Christmas time!

      The world's gone mad. Why celebrate? It really is a

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