(Swearing appropriate to the tone of the verse)
Why the fuck did you nick my bike?
What have I ever done to you?
Did it cross your mind how much it would upset me?
Or that I might not be able to afford to replace it?
Or do you just not give a fuck?
Did you stop to think about how hard I worked to try to get myself into better shape
After a really difficult time in my life
And that bike was part of that?
And how anxious I am now about freewheeling downhill in both mind and body
Because you chose to steal it?
And no, I didn’t have insurance
Because insurance costs a fucking fortune
Because so many bikes get nicked
Round here, in Hackney, E8.
Where people generally can’t afford to have their fucking stuff nicked, actually.
So, why do I feel guilty?
And stupid? And culpable?
Like it was my fault for chaining it up in public, not your fault for nicking it?
Actually, I blame the Council.
(I blame the Council for most things.)
My bike was chained to their bike stand
Outside their leisure centre
Overseen by their CCTV camera
And their CCTV camera was broken
And they hadn’t fixed it
And they still had a sign up saying that there was CCTV in operation
Even though there wasn’t
And they hadn’t told leisure centre members
Despite us paying 48 fucking quid a month in membership fees.
But you nicked my bike.
You. Not the Council.
I’ve reported it to the Police.
Fat lot of good that did.
I’ve got the frame number.
Shall I check Gumtree and eBay every day?
Or visit that certain Sunday market in Whitechapel
Or that certain weekend sale by London Fields
That everyone knows sell knocked-off bikes?
Or shall I just give up and write a poem about it?
And yeah, I know that all property is theft
But that’s no excuse to add your theft to the system’s theft, is it?
In any case, my bike is hardly the means of fucking production is it?
(Only in the sense that it takes me to work and back
And that doesn’t count.)
And yeah, I know that life’s not fair
And I’m sure you’re very fucking alienated
But that’s no excuse to make it even less fair, is it?
And yeah, I know that Robin Hood was an honourable thief,
Stealing from the rich to give to the poor
But you’re a robbing bastard.
This wasn’t shoplifting from a multinational supermarket to feed your family, was it?
This wasn’t the desperate need for a means of transport to make a mercy dash to save people from impending disaster, was it?
(No, because if it had been, you’d have given it back by now.)
And yeah, in the world I want to see,
Neither I nor anyone else would need to own their own, personal bicycle
Because there would be bikes in common for everyone to use
A bit like Boris Bikes, but without the hire charges
And without Boris.
But we’re not on my planet, are we?
I do need my own personal bike
And I had one
Until you made the decision to pinch it.
And if we want to get rid of the robbery inherent in the system
We have to change the system
And to do that, we need solidarity
And solidarity does not include
NICKING MY FUCKING BIKE.
So yeah, I might have a Marxist analysis of the roots of crime
But you’re still a fucking toerag.
