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Why so many self-portraits ?
Vanity, or an honest appraisal ?
Why the endless tortured brow,
And wistful gaze of hazel ?
Are they honest, or distorted ?
Simply practice, or masterclass ?
Or is the cheapest model that funds allow
A looking-glass ?
Consumer Power
The clothes we wear, the food we try,
The very homes in which we dwell –
No matter how much money, cash is not enough.
The truth is, we can only buy
What someone else will make and sell.
And if we don’t like anything on offer ? Tough !
Sports Lawns
Mow and roll and mark the lines
To hem the court and pen the pitch
In Summer’s crisp and white designs of old,
To show which end is which.
And who would dare to stray beyond
This canvas where we set our scene ?
We’re safe in here from blade and frond,
On alternating stripes of green.
Soil Savants
Slime moulds lack brains
But still can get around –
Navigating maps and mazes,
Simple cells yet going places !
Building networks for our trains,
With tunnels through the ground –
Their tendrils stretch and seek and probe,
Across the petri-dish and globe.
Acorn Margins
I’ve heard that oak will make a hedge
If planted it in a row,
But I’ve never seen a single stretch –
Perhaps it’s just too slow.
Or hedgers baulk at pruning oaklings back
To make a wall,
When ev’rything about them says ‘Don’t hack,
But grow me tall.’
Raised Eyebrows, Wobbly Club
Pornography made proper by time,
With even the blue-rinse enthralled –
They snigger in Tolpuddle, Durdle, and Lyme,
Whatever the old man is called.
Surn is in Switzerland, Cairn is in Dorset –
The Abbas is hard in her C.
The Giant is likewise, and stands to endorse it,
With hard-ons for hadrons, says he.
Wireless-less
Left my phone at home – what a pain,
Now I haven’t a thing to read on the train.
I hope that nobody needs to reach me –
My own stupid fault, but I guess this’ll teach me.
And the loss of my music is just as bad –
But I wonder if there’s a poem to be had…?
A rant at the waste of a day I must frown on…
Then again, what will I write it down on ?
Dog Tags
The names of dogs shall change and flex,
With the rise and fall of Gus and Rex,
As their names are called around the lido –
Though these days, no-one calls Fido.
Folks in the park are a diverse lot,
And so are their dogs – but none is Spot.
Some names, it seems, are truly over –
Hello Lola, goodbye Rover.
Gallybaggers
How do scarecrows scare crows ?
Who knows ?
They seem such feeble foes.
Do they even work, do you suppose ?
With their hessian nose and wooden toes,
These crucified guards in hand-me-down clothes
Must scare the birds that thieve he rows.
But corbs are smart, and their learning shows
As they crop the crops while their wardens doze…
Sleep in Solo
We may lie down together,
But we always sleep alone.
Whatever dreams we’re slave to,
We must face them on our own.
When sleep makes heavy weather,
I can hold you till the sun,
But I cannot come and save you,
And there’s nowhere you can run.
Rhyming Couplets 