The Old Campaigner

Published: 25th March 2010

• I was very sad not to be able to attend John Rety’s memorial, as I was in hospital.
I’ve known him since he started Torriano Meeting House poetry nights in 1982, where I became a regular. I was one of the countless poets who benefited from his overflowing generosity in putting on readings for them and, later, in his Hearing Eye publishing venture. His love of poetry and his love of life simply poured out like sunshine.
As I could not be present on the day, would you allow me to offer my tribute to John:

The Old Campaigner
 
The old campaigner still keeps on the go.
He is as prickly as a roving bramble,
he’s difficult but yet we love him so.
 
He turns up everywhere, is in the know.
He does not hurry as he likes to amble.
The old campaigner still keeps on the go.
 
His lengthy rhetoric will ebb and flow,
epigrammatic but prefers to ramble.
He’s difficult but yet we love him so.
 
On every march for justice he will show,
in gnomic woolly hat you’ll see him shamble.
The old campaigner still keeps on the go.
 
He’s open-hearted, kind to friend and foe
but when his rage may boil is just a gamble.
He’s difficult but yet we love him so.
 
Year in, year out, in sun, in rain, in snow,
it’s that old anarchic wimble wamble.
The old campaigner still keeps on the go,
he’s difficult but yet we love him so.
DINAH LIVINGSTONE, NW1