The Angel on the High Street
(Incorporating The Diggers’ Song by Gerard Winstanley, 1649)
“The first coffee house in all of England”
read the freshly-painted sandwich board outside
And as I walked through the doors of the Angel Inn
that bright mid-morning in early June
a steamy, earthy, bitter-sweet cloud
engulfed
and possessed
and bewitched me
Stopped me in my steps
and made me close my eyes
and through inquisitive, quivering nostrils
fill my lungs and senses to overflowing with such dizzying and promising vapour
And when I opened my eyes
there behind the counter
stood three complete strangers
who, over those summer months, were to become my cherished friends
Jacob the Jew, proud proprietor of that pioneering venture
and a brave man to weather England’s ancient spite
Murad the Turk, proud importer and master roaster
down from London to facilitate the opening
and Hannah – well,
Hannah was called many things
They were exciting yet profoundly uneasy times in Oxford that summer
exciting yet profoundly uneasy times throughout the land
the king’s head recently severed
the Commonwealth declared
England turned upside down
and inside out
and not yet sure who she was
or who she could become
But despite the recent, vicious executions at Burford
I still wore my Leveller’s green ribbon with pride
Our hopes for a far better world
had not yet been extinguished
Murad was teaching Hannah the tricks of the trade
pouring freshly-brewed coffee from a large tin kettle
into a handsome, three-legged, freshly-polished copper pot
as reverently as any Roman Catholic priest
filling the chalice with consecrated wine
“Welcome, brave Leveller,” said Jacob
which made me smile
Murad looked up and bowed his head as respectfully as only Turks know how
and then placed a minaret-shaped lid upon the pot
And Hannah
Hannah just briefly glanced her eyelids upwards
but instantly I was smitten
as many of us were
A Jew and a Mohammedan and a Christian
The New Jerusalem indeed!
It was by far the best penny I’ve ever spent
I carried my steaming cup to the sunniest corner of the Inn
sat down
lifted the porcelain rim to my lips
and welcomed into my mouth and belly and blood and mind
a liquid black hell that tasted of liquid black heaven
For the second time in a day, I was smitten
A locksmith I recognised from Saint Ebbes
asked if he could join me
“I saw your ribbon,” he said
and we struck up friendship straight away
William he was
a refugee from the Diggers’ failed Utopia at Wellingborough
his eyes still burning with revolutionary fire
Spurred on by this dark and wondrously new-fangled brew
we talked and argued and laughed for hours
our tongues and minds galloping with such
swift and playful
coffee-infused delight
Our corner of the shop soon became known as Gabbers’ Corner
Given that Jacob observed both the Hebrew and the Christian Sabbaths
Thursday nights became our main debating nights
and as long as there were at least still six of us still purchasing at a regular pace
we often made it through til Friday dawn
and given that I was then a groundsman at Magdalen
conveniently for me – my mind and body still buzzing – straight to work
The basic rules were soon established:
No drunks
No topic denied
All stations equal
Attack the argument but not the man
And don’t forget to look each man in the eye before you leave
Oh, such a precious pocket of freedom we enjoyed and sustained all summer long
despite all the news that crossed the Angel’s threshold
chronicling the ratcheting increments of Cromwell’s tightening grip
And that July evening!
That July evening!
We must have been debating property and suffrage yet again
and one of our number made the mistake
of asking Hannah, behind the counter, for her womanly opinion
“Gentlemen,” she answered
“Forgive me if I see things more simply than you do.
But if we are all equal before the Lord of the Heavenly Commonwealth,
then surely we are all equal within this man-made Commonwealth.
And thus, quite naturally:
one man, one vote...”
But through the all the cheers and jeers
she hushed us all
held the room in the palm of her hand
and continued
“...and one woman, one vote as well”
Well, I have never seen nor heard ex-Agitators and academics and merchants and Puritans and closet Royalists
so united
But once the uproar had died down
William asked her to expound
“Gentlemen,” she repied
“Let me put it more poetically:
either everybody dances
or nobody dances.
And, pray
what is a dance
without a woman?”
Well! The second uproar was even louder than the first
but now woven through with astonished laughter
“The lass speaks as if she were our equal!” spluttered one of the Puritans into his cup
and he didn’t mean it as a compliment
“She speaks like that Ranter, Coppe!” declared another
which carried more than a touch of menace
for Oxford’s very own Abeizer Coppe was then languishing in Newgate Prison
and copies of his Fiery Flying Roll had recently been burned on Broad Street
Hannah, however
just stood there
like a firmly-rooted oak at the centre of a passing storm
I suspect that’s when William and Hannah finally fell in love
– or, rather, when Hannah finally deigned to return his love
He was a handsome rogue, William, I’ll give him that
But, as Solomon so wisely declared
there is a time to weep and a time to laugh
a time to mourn and a time to dance
and all seasons must surrender
to the next
It was early September
the week of the Saint Giles Fair
and we’d been up all night and William
– no man for property or rules –
broke us into Saint Mary’s church
and he and myself and Hannah ascended the tower’s narrowly spiralling steps
carrying a freshly-brewed pot
and three chipped cups
laughing and giggling and shushing like naughty children
Well, it was the first and only time I’ve ever ascended that tower
and the view that we stepped out into
it made me feel like a king
the king of everything I saw:
the whole of Oxford spread below us and all around us
its multitude of spires and towers and cloisters
the High Street’s gentle, subtle, well-strung curve
the meadows of Christ Church shrouded with early morning, Thames-borne mist
the forests of Wytham to the north-west and Shotover to the east
both swollen with a dark and brooding dawn-lit green
And as Hannah poured the coffee
and as I packed my pipe with tobacco
William simply raised his chin to the breeze
opened his throat
and struck up with one of Winstanley’s stirring songs:
You noble Diggers all, stand up now, stand up now,
You noble Diggers all, stand up now,
The waste land to maintain, seeing Cavaliers by name
Your digging do disdain and your persons all defame
Stand up now, Diggers all.
Your houses they pull down, stand up now, stand up now,
Your houses they pull down, stand up now.
Your houses they pull down to fright poor men in town,
But the gentry must come down and the poor shall wear the crown.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
With spades and hoes and ploughs, stand up now, stand up now,
With spades and hoes and ploughs, stand up now.
Your freedom to uphold, seeing Cavaliers are bold
To kill you if they could and rights from you withhold.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
Their self-will is their law, stand up now, stand up now,
Their self-will is their law, stand up now.
Since tyranny came in they count it now no sin
To make a gaol a gin and to serve poor men therein.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The gentry are all round, stand up now, stand up now,
The gentry are all round, stand up now.
The gentry are all round, on each side they are found,
Their wisdom’s so profound to cheat us of the ground.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The lawyers they conjoin, stand up now, stand up now,
The lawyers they conjoin, stand up now,
To arrest you they advise, such fury they devise,
But the devil in them lies, and hath blinded both their eyes.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The clergy they come in, stand up now, stand up now,
The clergy they come in, stand up now.
The clergy they come in and say it is a sin
That we should now begin our freedom for to win.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
’Gainst lawyers and ’gainst priests, stand up now, stand up now,
’Gainst lawyers and ’gainst Priests, stand up now.
For tyrants are they both even flat against their oath,
To grant us they are loath free meat and drink and cloth.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The club is all their law, stand up now, stand up now,
The club is all their law, stand up now.
The club is all their law to keep poor folk in awe,
That they no vision saw to maintain such a law.
Glory now, Diggers all.
And then, as if on the instructions of an attending angel
the red diamond light of the rising sun
suddenly broke through Shotover’s horizon
and I swear
the unspeakable mysteries of earth and heaven and hell
flashed through all our eyes
and into our hearts
but were just as quickly
forgotten
We all stood in a silence
as deep as the deepest ocean
But as I swirled my cup to settle the dregs
Hannah turned to me and quietly said
“We’ll both miss you when we’re gone”
Was Hannah with child?
I opened my mouth to question her
but William put his finger to his lips
Levity had now turned to severity in his eyes
“Tell not a soul,” he said
Had they got wind of possible persecution?
– for Oxford was full of cheap informers
and tightly-pinched spies
Suddenly I felt a real political fear
spread like ice within my political blood
and my dreamer’s heart
it plummeted
like a cannon ball made of lead
For in that moment
I knew that our naive summer of coffee-fuelled liberty
was well and truly over
that these two dear, dear friends would soon be
gone from my daily life
and that I’d never taste such a summer as this
ever again
(Incorporating The Diggers’ Song by Gerard Winstanley, 1649)
“The first coffee house in all of England”
read the freshly-painted sandwich board outside
And as I walked through the doors of the Angel Inn
that bright mid-morning in early June
a steamy, earthy, bitter-sweet cloud
engulfed
and possessed
and bewitched me
Stopped me in my steps
and made me close my eyes
and through inquisitive, quivering nostrils
fill my lungs and senses to overflowing with such dizzying and promising vapour
And when I opened my eyes
there behind the counter
stood three complete strangers
who, over those summer months, were to become my cherished friends
Jacob the Jew, proud proprietor of that pioneering venture
and a brave man to weather England’s ancient spite
Murad the Turk, proud importer and master roaster
down from London to facilitate the opening
and Hannah – well,
Hannah was called many things
They were exciting yet profoundly uneasy times in Oxford that summer
exciting yet profoundly uneasy times throughout the land
the king’s head recently severed
the Commonwealth declared
England turned upside down
and inside out
and not yet sure who she was
or who she could become
But despite the recent, vicious executions at Burford
I still wore my Leveller’s green ribbon with pride
Our hopes for a far better world
had not yet been extinguished
Murad was teaching Hannah the tricks of the trade
pouring freshly-brewed coffee from a large tin kettle
into a handsome, three-legged, freshly-polished copper pot
as reverently as any Roman Catholic priest
filling the chalice with consecrated wine
“Welcome, brave Leveller,” said Jacob
which made me smile
Murad looked up and bowed his head as respectfully as only Turks know how
and then placed a minaret-shaped lid upon the pot
And Hannah
Hannah just briefly glanced her eyelids upwards
but instantly I was smitten
as many of us were
A Jew and a Mohammedan and a Christian
The New Jerusalem indeed!
It was by far the best penny I’ve ever spent
I carried my steaming cup to the sunniest corner of the Inn
sat down
lifted the porcelain rim to my lips
and welcomed into my mouth and belly and blood and mind
a liquid black hell that tasted of liquid black heaven
For the second time in a day, I was smitten
A locksmith I recognised from Saint Ebbes
asked if he could join me
“I saw your ribbon,” he said
and we struck up friendship straight away
William he was
a refugee from the Diggers’ failed Utopia at Wellingborough
his eyes still burning with revolutionary fire
Spurred on by this dark and wondrously new-fangled brew
we talked and argued and laughed for hours
our tongues and minds galloping with such
swift and playful
coffee-infused delight
Our corner of the shop soon became known as Gabbers’ Corner
Given that Jacob observed both the Hebrew and the Christian Sabbaths
Thursday nights became our main debating nights
and as long as there were at least still six of us still purchasing at a regular pace
we often made it through til Friday dawn
and given that I was then a groundsman at Magdalen
conveniently for me – my mind and body still buzzing – straight to work
The basic rules were soon established:
No drunks
No topic denied
All stations equal
Attack the argument but not the man
And don’t forget to look each man in the eye before you leave
Oh, such a precious pocket of freedom we enjoyed and sustained all summer long
despite all the news that crossed the Angel’s threshold
chronicling the ratcheting increments of Cromwell’s tightening grip
And that July evening!
That July evening!
We must have been debating property and suffrage yet again
and one of our number made the mistake
of asking Hannah, behind the counter, for her womanly opinion
“Gentlemen,” she answered
“Forgive me if I see things more simply than you do.
But if we are all equal before the Lord of the Heavenly Commonwealth,
then surely we are all equal within this man-made Commonwealth.
And thus, quite naturally:
one man, one vote...”
But through the all the cheers and jeers
she hushed us all
held the room in the palm of her hand
and continued
“...and one woman, one vote as well”
Well, I have never seen nor heard ex-Agitators and academics and merchants and Puritans and closet Royalists
so united
But once the uproar had died down
William asked her to expound
“Gentlemen,” she repied
“Let me put it more poetically:
either everybody dances
or nobody dances.
And, pray
what is a dance
without a woman?”
Well! The second uproar was even louder than the first
but now woven through with astonished laughter
“The lass speaks as if she were our equal!” spluttered one of the Puritans into his cup
and he didn’t mean it as a compliment
“She speaks like that Ranter, Coppe!” declared another
which carried more than a touch of menace
for Oxford’s very own Abeizer Coppe was then languishing in Newgate Prison
and copies of his Fiery Flying Roll had recently been burned on Broad Street
Hannah, however
just stood there
like a firmly-rooted oak at the centre of a passing storm
I suspect that’s when William and Hannah finally fell in love
– or, rather, when Hannah finally deigned to return his love
He was a handsome rogue, William, I’ll give him that
But, as Solomon so wisely declared
there is a time to weep and a time to laugh
a time to mourn and a time to dance
and all seasons must surrender
to the next
It was early September
the week of the Saint Giles Fair
and we’d been up all night and William
– no man for property or rules –
broke us into Saint Mary’s church
and he and myself and Hannah ascended the tower’s narrowly spiralling steps
carrying a freshly-brewed pot
and three chipped cups
laughing and giggling and shushing like naughty children
Well, it was the first and only time I’ve ever ascended that tower
and the view that we stepped out into
it made me feel like a king
the king of everything I saw:
the whole of Oxford spread below us and all around us
its multitude of spires and towers and cloisters
the High Street’s gentle, subtle, well-strung curve
the meadows of Christ Church shrouded with early morning, Thames-borne mist
the forests of Wytham to the north-west and Shotover to the east
both swollen with a dark and brooding dawn-lit green
And as Hannah poured the coffee
and as I packed my pipe with tobacco
William simply raised his chin to the breeze
opened his throat
and struck up with one of Winstanley’s stirring songs:
You noble Diggers all, stand up now, stand up now,
You noble Diggers all, stand up now,
The waste land to maintain, seeing Cavaliers by name
Your digging do disdain and your persons all defame
Stand up now, Diggers all.
Your houses they pull down, stand up now, stand up now,
Your houses they pull down, stand up now.
Your houses they pull down to fright poor men in town,
But the gentry must come down and the poor shall wear the crown.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
With spades and hoes and ploughs, stand up now, stand up now,
With spades and hoes and ploughs, stand up now.
Your freedom to uphold, seeing Cavaliers are bold
To kill you if they could and rights from you withhold.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
Their self-will is their law, stand up now, stand up now,
Their self-will is their law, stand up now.
Since tyranny came in they count it now no sin
To make a gaol a gin and to serve poor men therein.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The gentry are all round, stand up now, stand up now,
The gentry are all round, stand up now.
The gentry are all round, on each side they are found,
Their wisdom’s so profound to cheat us of the ground.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The lawyers they conjoin, stand up now, stand up now,
The lawyers they conjoin, stand up now,
To arrest you they advise, such fury they devise,
But the devil in them lies, and hath blinded both their eyes.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The clergy they come in, stand up now, stand up now,
The clergy they come in, stand up now.
The clergy they come in and say it is a sin
That we should now begin our freedom for to win.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
’Gainst lawyers and ’gainst priests, stand up now, stand up now,
’Gainst lawyers and ’gainst Priests, stand up now.
For tyrants are they both even flat against their oath,
To grant us they are loath free meat and drink and cloth.
Stand up now, Diggers all.
The club is all their law, stand up now, stand up now,
The club is all their law, stand up now.
The club is all their law to keep poor folk in awe,
That they no vision saw to maintain such a law.
Glory now, Diggers all.
And then, as if on the instructions of an attending angel
the red diamond light of the rising sun
suddenly broke through Shotover’s horizon
and I swear
the unspeakable mysteries of earth and heaven and hell
flashed through all our eyes
and into our hearts
but were just as quickly
forgotten
We all stood in a silence
as deep as the deepest ocean
But as I swirled my cup to settle the dregs
Hannah turned to me and quietly said
“We’ll both miss you when we’re gone”
Was Hannah with child?
I opened my mouth to question her
but William put his finger to his lips
Levity had now turned to severity in his eyes
“Tell not a soul,” he said
Had they got wind of possible persecution?
– for Oxford was full of cheap informers
and tightly-pinched spies
Suddenly I felt a real political fear
spread like ice within my political blood
and my dreamer’s heart
it plummeted
like a cannon ball made of lead
For in that moment
I knew that our naive summer of coffee-fuelled liberty
was well and truly over
that these two dear, dear friends would soon be
gone from my daily life
and that I’d never taste such a summer as this
ever again
