The Lack of The Circumflex in the British Îles

Ah, the French, with their hats upon their vowels
That they wear as a reminder to the fickleness of fate –
For there used to be a consonant, since buried in the bowels,
And thus no letter’s truly safe unless it pulls its weight.
For even though the final consonants are free to stay,
L’Académie insists on hats, and French must all obey it –
These warn them of the missing ‘s’ they had, but threw away,
And how they must remember not to say it.

In English, though, it’s understood
We keep the silents hanging round –
Cos once they’re in, they’re in for good,
However pointless and unsound.
They’re traps, just waiting to be sprung –
We keep the buggers out of spite,
To trip up Johnny Foreign’s tongue.
Bloody minded ?  Bloody right !

Maximum Maxims

We all cringe at clitches,
They bring on the twitches –
We see them as hackneyed and vague.
We look-down on clitches
As droppings and glitches,
Avoiding them all like the plague.

But with such a dissing,
Just see what we’re missing !
Take heed, here’s a word to the wise –
There’s beauty in clitches
That awes and bewitches
The scales from over our eyes.

There’s wisdom on view,
And variety too,
Each diff’rent as chalk is from cheese.
By rushing past clitches
For linguistic riches
We’re missing the wood for the trees.

They still get it right,
Thought they often seem trite –
Familiar breeding contempt.
They’re seen as, these clitches,
Too big for their britches,
As language that’s drab and unkempt.

I know we get lazy
And pluck the same daisy
Each time when the going gets tough,
But still we need clitches
To scratch where it itches
When other words just ain’t enough.

If we were more caring
We’d use them but sparing –
Then surely they’d still pack a punch
The wit of some clitches
Should have us in stitches
(But don’t, when it comes to the crunch.)

If used in rotation,
The next generation
Will not suffer famine nor feast.
Don’t wear out the clitches
Or park them in niches,
But gladly embrace with the beast.

Let’s let them lie low,
Take it steady and slow,
For a little will go a long way.
There’s life in the clitches,
New tricks in the bitches,
For ev’ry old dog has his day.

Terminator Traitor

This rhyme is too faulty, it just doesn’t sit,
It’s splutty and halty, it stumbles awry.
This rhyme is too salty, it rattles with grit,
It’s ragged and jolty, it’s sneaky and sly.

And there is your problem, your verse is a word-crime,
Demurred-crime, absurd-crime, an everyone-heard-crime.
So there is your problem, your verse is an eye-rhyme,
A dry-rhyme, a shy-rhyme, a just-couldn’t-try-rhyme.

We’ve all of us done it, we have to admit,
We kick it and stun it, and hope they won’t espy.
We’ve gambled and run it, with rhymes not legit,
We’ve all of us spun it, and hoped it would fly.

But you sir, yes, you sir, you jolly-well knew, sir !
Your rhyme is untrue, sir, it does not apply.
For shame, sir, it’s lame, sir, you must face the blame, sir
They don’t sound the same, sir, your rhyme is a lie.

Lost Quotations

Is this how this verse will end,
As a barely remembered line or two
And all the rest a blur of forty years ?
When memory is no friend,
And anyway, maybe you never knew
The rest of it, that never reached your ears.
At least you can still pretend
If you pin up a card with a precious few
Of its words, to the scrutiny of wordy peers,
Then one of them yet can mend
The missing heart, and finally claim its due –
And spare it from the fate each poet fears.