Where were you when you heard
The death knell sound at Ibrox?
Me, I was in Clongriffin –
Where dreams go to die –
Working in a hole
Filled with strife.
It was the day before
Valentine’s
And I was buttering a roll
For a man I didn’t know
When a voice on the radio announced
“R*****s appoint administrators,”
And we both exclaimed
“Jaysuuus!” –
He in ecstasy;
I in trepidity;
“Sure fuck ‘em!” his reply –
“We need them,” mine.
And one-by-one
Locals come in smiling,
In United and Liverpool jerseys,
But insisting they’re Celtic, too –
Telling me how great it is,
“The end of the scum.”
But my reasoning –
Scattered –
Is lost
In the sadistic smatterings
Of the ecstatic mind,
And I have to wait to get home
Before realisation kicks in.
The reckoning was inevitable,
The artful dodger can
Only dodge so artfully –
But to celebrate is crass,
Even with those memories
Of the hearse parked
Outside Parkhead
In our own dark days.
Victims of geography,
We both lived
Through periods of luxury:
Let us not forget the 90s
Where they loomed large
As we faced Death,
Inhaling his cold embrace,
And within minutes of succumbing –
Until Fergus swooped
To do things properly
(even unpopularly).
It has always been
Celtic & Rangers
Or
Rangers & Celtic,
The Old Firm together
In spite of each other.
The drama of two football teams
Occasionally about the football,
But mostly about the passion –
And the sectarianism, the bigotry,
And unsavoury things
Unrelated to football,
Yet related to history,
Which seems more important.
And we all have our own memories –
These are some of mine:
Vague recollections of
The impending fear of
Ten-in-a-row;
The elation felt when
We won one-in-a-row
Under Wim;
‘The Humping’ of ’98,
The Magician decimating them
Under orders from Doctor Who,
(if only they were ten years younger);
My father regaling me
With a story of how he met
A rather mouthy R*****s fan
In a Glasgow hotel –
Whose head he proceeded
To shove down a toilet;
The devastation of handing
It straight back at Parkhead
To that Dick,
And the flying coin
Which added injury to insult
(the memory of Dallas);
The embarrassing failings of
Barnes and Shite
(travails);
The day in the sun when Martin
Let us glimpse Paradise Gained
With a 6-2 win
And that “sensational” goal
By the King of Kings;
The devastation of 2002/03,
Losing to them by one goal overall,
Big John called offside in the final
When television proved otherwise
(thanks Sepp):
The golden year of the golden age
Which gleaned nothing –
And yet everything;
The season they were stung
Five-for-five,
With big Chris chipping home
In fatigue over expectation in the fifth –
And scoring nonetheless;
Reading about the unfortunate English,
And realising that a spirit
Resides between the Parkhead posts:
John Thomson is his name;
Thommo thundering home
In the 84th minute,
And Thommo getting sent off
Over there three times –
No more a hero
And no less a villain,
But exactly what we needed
When we needed it;
Scott McDonald
Pulling a goal out of his arse
To rob Martin of one
Last title glory
(how glad was I to see him
In hoops not long after) –
A reminder of how a title
Is not always lost in a game
Against them;
Sammy, so frustrating,
Yet succeeding where he
Failed in the South,
Blitzing them with a brace
On one of his better days;
Scott Brown levelling in the Scottish Cup
And turning, arms out-stretched,
To face that pantomime villain,
El Hadji Diouf;
And even this season,
Fifteen points away at Halloween,
The Christmas saw Joe climb highest
And drag us two points away –
Daylight at last.
Now diminished.
The shining Whyte Knight
(who they never believed in anyway)
Has sold them out,
But they chased a pipe dream,
Spending Premier League
Where only the SPL could do;
Cheating the Queen
Who they profess to love so much,
And now the Queen wants tax-back –
Such is the irony
Of monarchy,
And with so much history
In the balance,
All we can do is sing:
“Jelly & ice-cream when R****rs die!
Jelly & ice-cream when R****rs die!
Jelly & ice-cream when R****rs die!
Jelly & ice-cream when R****rs die!”
But afterwards, what about afterwards?
When we have
Washed the jelly & ice-cream down
With pint after pint,
And we wake up hungover,
Dehydrated, delirious,
Blabbering about beating them,
Then what?
Where do we look for the tense
Excitement of the Old Firm derby?
From whence will come the challenge,
That thundering blue?
When somebody overcomes
The one obstacle standing between
Them and success,
How do they motivate themselves?
The Old Firm have done it
For over a century
Because they have had each other –
And now that is in the balance.
So enjoy the jelly & ice-cream, Bhoys and Ghirls,
Enjoy the demise of them as they would have us,
Enjoy the promise of a future free of bigotry
(even though bigotry will never die),
And enjoy lording it over their fans,
As Ibrox becomes a ghost stadium –
But just remember where you were
When the team you grew up supporting
Lost its perpetual nemesis without equal:
Remember the day the jelly & ice-cream
Tasted its absolute sweetest and remember how
It will never be so sweet again.
And remember the electricity of Old Firm days –
And remember how you will never get them back.
Happy Valentine’s Day, 2012.
