Daniel (and Bonny)

Three years ago - a man's possessions - Daniel Kelly - disintegrating damp cardboard box. Charity shop.

There were a number of books by Marx and Engels. Books from the Soviet Union on culture, art, history and technology - all bound with communist propaganda - the march to a brave new world - governed by the workers. A committed communist. A different era.

There was also a battered address book, with loose leaves of paper. Revolutionary poems he wrote: all around 1971/2 - perhaps poetry of no literary merit - but heartfelt - touching. And disillusioned. But then a single anachronistic note about a book he ordered: Bonzai gardening -"Regret to inform you..." - out of stock. 1984. I wonder - did that upset him - was he saddened? A yearning for something living to nurture, quietly. The note then interleaved with a past self. An obsolete past.

1984: a mythical year. The UK was well into the Thatcher era, after the collapse of the "socialist" Labour government of Callaghan. Labour imploding - unemployment - boys from the black stuff. It feels like he is retreating. Although I can still remember the Socialist Workers Party was very active, socialism was dying in England.

What drove him to these beliefs - these hopes? When was he born? Did he endure the depressions of the 20's and 30's; would he have been aware of the Spanish Civil War; would he have been a soldier in the war? Enduring memories. After those imperialist/capitalst catastrophes - socialism was hope.

Then I found...

Metropolitan Police officers at the Lambeth Missing Persons Unit, South London are trying to trace any relatives, or friends of: Daniel Christopher KELLY, who lived in Kennington, South London. Little is known of his background other than he was born in 1920.

Posted on missing pesons site, 2004. I don't know if this is him... That age seems to make sense. It's the right area of London. I found the books in 2005.

A story - the story? I wish I could describe the feelings it evokes within me - sadness - melancholia.

Bonny is the only mention of another. A young girl. I try to imagine Bonny - 24 years old, early seventies England enduring the hangover of the swinging sixties. The energy he must have felt from her. Half his age. He sounds in awe of her - not daring to approach. And then 12 years pass: bonzai gardening in South Norwood - a solitary pursuit. Then, it seems, he died alone.

---

The working man's lot.

He gets up in the morning when daylight is rare,
he'd like some breakfast, but the cupboard is bare.
He arrives at the job just in time,
and spends eight or more hours in the muck and the grime.

All the week he wonders what he's working for,
at the end sees his wage bag and knows the score.
The boss we know gets the biggest chunk,
he says he works hard for it, what a load of bunk.



Stalinist! Hard liners! That's what they say,
but marxism-Leninism keeps these liberals at bay.
We'll fight opportunists wherever they may be,
exposing their misconceptions for all to see.
They say the "British road" is the road we should tread,
something self-respecting communists regard with dread.
They water down communism to suit their own end,
any rules that don't suit them they conveniently bend.
Their cognition of Marxism is seriously lacking,
which is why, to their slogans, they have no backing.
They don't study facts, in all their totality,
Thus their theories don't conform to objective reality.

The polarization of the inner-party struggle in the CPGB. If it did nothing else, it did compel me to express my position in this way, as there was not an abundance of channels open to this line of thought.

To Bonny

I've come to really love you, by and by,
Your feet firmly on the ground, you head not in the sky.
With that glint of social realism in your eye
if the world should ever loose you, I would cry.

This I wrote on the birthday card I sent to Bonny on her 24th birthday (11/1/72). One of the nicest people I have met.

All by Daniel K. - 1971/2.