Poem: Frederick Engels
Most
don’t bother coming next and get the silver,
Or
being the second highest mountain in the world.
But
that was not the style of Frederick Engels,
He
held Marx’s flag aloft, proud and unfurled.
When
the brightest star is shining in the heavens,
You
would think a darker piece of sky was worth a try.
But
not if you were dear old Frederick Engels,
He
stood right next to Marx and held his head up high.
You
could never say he lived in Karl Marx’s shadow;
Shadows
weren’t the sort of thing to bother Fred.
In
honest proletarian cooperation
He
helped multiply Marx’s light and shadows fled.
No
one knew their dialectics like old Engels
And
though his death was the negation of his birth,
A
great productive life came in between them
And
negating the negation shows its worth.
The
negation of the death of Frederick Engels
Doesn’t
take us back to little Fred,
But
to the birth of a great proletarian movement
With
Marx and Engels ever at its head.
[Part of a poem written by Godfrey in November 1999 for a
meeting in celebration of Frederick Engels’ birthday, and used to close
Godfrey’s funeral service on 5 April 2012.]