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rumors

Rumor vs. Gossip

“It’s just a rumor that was spread around town,” opens the chorus of Elvis Costello’s elegiac 1982 song “Shipbuilding,” best known in its rendition by Robert Wyatt: The shipyard will soon reopen, for a war is starting, and British boys will soon be “diving for dear life / when we could be diving for pearls.”


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Bat House


Turn out the light and I’ll explain. 
—James Fenton

It’s where I’m heading
It’s what I overheard
The lines in the corner
The flaming word.

It’s what you expected
Your greatest fear
A chip in the teacup
Bills from last year.