Take it to the Bridge
There’s something in the air.
Sergeant Pepper has cast his spell.
Today the Bridge is covered in flowers.
Spelled out in organic cannabis plants on the wavy steps - ’Love and Peace’.
People have started to gather.
(Parking is no longer a problem – thanks to the free car-crushing facility at Walkley’s Mill.)
The checkout staff from the Coop are taking their places,
The Bonsalls are selling everyone a dozen panel-pins for two old pence.
Bob Dylan and Dylan Thomas and Dylan from the Magic Roundabout have arrived early to be sure of a good place.
Emmeline (stet – I looked it up) Pankhurst swaps jokes with Desmond Tutu,
Alice Longstaff and Martin Parr are photographing each other
And Father Ted Hughes turns up from Elmet.
Morecambeis Wise-cracking with Linda Smith,
A crack team of aromatherapists has been working on this for months – now a great healing cloud of perfume hovers over the valley.
The very air is pregnant with expectation:
And It’s A Boy! …. and A Girl and A Bike!
Here comes Albert Einstein, he’s reading an incomprehensible headline in the Hebden Bridge Times to Jimi Hendrix while flames shoot from his guitar (Albert’s that is).
Make way for Ivor Cutler - he’s wheeled in on a harmonium whilst jamming with the Junior Band.
Disturbed by the commotion, the writers of TV soaps look up from their laptops and are finally inspired to write positive storylines.
Sam Beckett is getting excited – it is rumoured that Godot will make an appearance.
“Great little shops.” he mutters.
And is that Arvo Part with James Lovelock, Fritjof Capra and Thomas Mapfumo and all the Blacks Unlimited coming onto the Bridge? They’re gigging at The Trades tonight.
Andy Goldsworthy releases a perfect line of scarlet petals into Hebden Water,
Tracy Emin has woven her underwear into a flag for Bernard Ingham to wave aloft.
“Windpower for ever!” he shouts.
Marcel Duchamp has made a new sculpture for St George’s Square in the shape of a huge urinal.
And yes, Yoko Ono has persuaded the Hepton Singers to take all their clothes off.
Meanwhile, E. F. Schumacher and Ghandi knit small and beautiful hemp shopping bags for the bag ladies.
William Blake recommends his hair-stylist to Einstein and Emily Bronte,
Miles Davis swaps riffs with The Peace Artistes.
The Big Issue sellers, no longer homeless, have prepared a treat for everyone: they distribute free dock pudding to the crowd.
Usherettes from the Picture House are handing out cups of tea and homemade cake.
And now - a choir of lesbians, 500 strong, descend on the Bridge from the Yorkshire Air Ambulance singing The Internationale.
This even beats the Duck Race!
And at last, here’s James Brown restored to life and sanity
(Para-reflexologists have been working all night re-aligning his chakras.)
He holds hands with the lesbians,
They lift their joined hands skywards in a Mexican wave of harmony
And the whole throng raise their voices in a mighty chorus:
“TAKE IT TO THE BRIDGE!”
Mike Barrett