Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

The pub was packed. Dozens had spilled into the pub garden where the landlord had placed an extra screen so no one would miss a thing.

   Jack couldn't see what was wrong with watching in private.

   Community spirit, mob mentality.

   'Looking forward to the show, Jack?' Jimmy Mcloughlin, chair of the Chorlton-on-Medlock Watercolour Society.

   'I am, Jimmy,' said Jack.

   'Gonna be tense in there. A lot of rivalries been simmering.'

   Jimmy had a crazy, feral streak, and lacked the normal human aversion to physical violence. Events like this were an excuse to vent the fury he brewed all year.

   'See you inside?'

   'Yes,' said Jack. 'But Jimmy - it's only art, remember?'

   Jimmy smiled, shook his head, and disappeared into the enclosing crowd.

   Jack wished he were actually there, at the exhibition. As usual he was policing the live coverage in the community.

   'It's your excellent people skills,' DCI Rogers explained. 'The people trust you, Jack. You have the ability to avoid taking sides, and we don't all have that. You understand the issues, but don't get worked up.'

   That might be true, but Jack would still rather be there, with the star artists and celebrities. At the actual event it was much easier to control the disorder that always went with these big exhibitions. The Velasquez in Birmingham, the Monet in Sheffield, the Titian in Liverpool, they all ended up the same. Bloodbaths. At the actual event you were in a controlled environment and could use your baton, your cuffs, and sometimes, if you got the go ahead, gas and water cannon. It had been known. Kandinsky at Leeds for example. Two dead, dozens injured. At Mondrian they had gone mental. Jack had no reason to believe that Art Treasures of the UK in Manchester would be any different.

   Here, at the White Swan in Fallowfield, he'd get to have a few friendly words with the so-called community leaders who would calm things down a little if Jack were lucky, but if anything serious kicked off it could end up with him calling for back up. And how did that make him look? Still, he wouldn't ring right way. He'd let them have their head. There were advantages to being at the heart of the trouble. He patted the bulge in his inside pocket. When it all kicked off and no one was watching, Jack would get an opportunity to practice his own art.

   He looked across the pub to where the Italian supporters were sat. Next to them the Pre-Raphaelite brigade, then the photography lot, then the grassroots mob from the smaller schools and provincial galleries. The grass-roots were the worst. Jimmy's bunch, the Chorlton-on-Medlock Watercolour Society, were notoriously vicious. Yet the hard core had been flushed out long ago. Guns were off the scene, and the violence had become ritualised - balletic almost. Their neat, quick razors made blood spritz up in a fine spray, making things look much worse than the actual wounds inflicted. The fighting was almost ceremonial and had gathered around itself a beauty of its own.

   The screen flickered and soon the camera was off, tracking along the main exhibits. Paintings floated by and at each one another 'ooo' or 'aah' was exhaled by the dazzled viewers. Then the camera came to the decorative art section and stopped on the Italian Sgabello chair.

   Jimmy McLoughlin leapt up. 'A chair? A fucking chair? How exactly is that art? If I want to look at a chair I'll visit World of fucking Leather. Get this shite off our screens.'

   Bedlam broke out. They fought in the pub, in the garden and in the streets.

   Jack watched from the edge, his hand from time to time drifting towards his pocket. There were occasions when he thought he might need backup. But eventually the rioters got tired and the fighting relaxed into a drowsy punch-up, as if underwater.

   Jack spoke to Jimmy before they grabbed him. 'Come on, Jimmy. You could stop this if you wanted to. You have influence. It's only art, after all.'

   'Only art,' Jimmy said. 'For Christ's sake Jack, your problem is you don't feel it. You know the names of the artists, you know the history, you can name all the movements, you've got it all pat. You can pass that off in the pub. But you don't feel it here. That's what this is all about.' He waved his hand towards the knots of scuffling bodies, the burning cars, the shattered shop windows, the tongues of flame from petrol bombs. `Passion, it's called.' The Pre-Raphaelites dragged Jimmy down a Ginnel and Jack followed close behind. He didn't intervene. Jimmy wouldn't have wanted him to. In the dim light of the Ginnel Jack saw the glint of the blade as they held him down. He took out his camera and began to film. He had a live feed to dozens of pubs in the south part of the city. There would be cheers as the close up of Jimmy's face filled the screen and screams of delight when the blade slipped across his stubbly face and delicate feathers of crimson flicked up. This was what discerning art lovers wanted, this was art at its highest, with real emotions and real people, an art form few understood but for those who did, was the highest of all, and Jack, a pioneer.