Pilgrim's Progress

I have a Marxist friend in India who bullied me into promising him that I would make the pilgrimage to High gate Cemetery and (I have to whisper this) pluck a blade of grass from near Karl Marx's grave for him. "Don't bring me any of your decadent Scotch whisky," he declared. My other guilty-capitalist friend, who had been threatening mayhem if I came back without a bottle of Glenfiddich, slunk off with his conscience in tatters. Anyway, I made the journey to the wretched place. There were a few people. A group of Japanese tourists were getting themselves photographed. I even spotted a couple of winos in somnambulistic stupor. And good old Karl seemed to cast an avuncular eye on the scene. The atmosphere was that of an intellectual being feted in a most non-partisan manner for his ideas. Not so wretched after all, I thought. But then I remembered the Gulag. The Cultural Revolution. Pol Pot and that gang of global ogres. All of whom drew succour, and sustenance, from the pronouncements of the man who lay here. I was turning to leave when I remembered. I plucked that blade of grass. But it was not for me.