I wrote this while working in a factory in Broadheath, Altrincham in 1989. I couldn’t believe that gritty, oily, noisy world still existed and wanted to describe it in verse.

Working in a factory, compressed air and oil

Grey old men, unsmiling faces, unhappy in their toil

Far away from compact discs and things that make life pleasant

Dangerous hissing machinery worked by brain-dead peasants

They’ll get their pittance owed to them on Thursday afternoon

Handed out by a dark-suited man in a gloomy little room

Then empty heads but smiling faces they race down to the pub

And drink a pint or twenty then the chippy for some grub

Monday morning rounds them up, they punch their clockcards “in”

Two days of beer went bloody quick says one in the deafening din

I know these things because I’ve seen them a life without thought or cheer

I ask myself each morning, what the hell am I doing here?