Poets Corner

FIVE VERSES FOR THE LAST SHIFT

16-07-2007

In the end, just five jobs were lost when the Royal Brierley factory in Dudley closed last week, but that only tells part of the story. The company had been making quality glass in the Black Country for 231 years, and once employed 700 people. Brendan Hawthorne reads the last rites.

Five Verses For The Last Shift

Glory holes are exchanged for dole

For the workers of Royal Brierley

Another wholesale woeful tale

Of factory gates closing entirely

Customs are panned by auditors hands

No irons need be left in the fire

No marvering to do or wet papering

As the last piece is drawn from desire

No crystal ball foretold the fall

Of the giants of cut-glass industries

No foot-fall heed for the klaxon call

No market for baubles and sundries

The cutter’s wheel no longer squeals

His art has died off with the rest

Beckoning extinction through dereliction

There’s no prize for being the best

Now exhibitions are made of traditions

And the bellowing cheeks of blowers

Those forgotten times of crafts sublime

Are memories for the heart-felt followers