Dürer’s-Rhino Syndrome

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The Rhinoceros by Albrecht Dürer, though don’t ask me if it’s the right way round.

Dürer’s-Rhino Syndrome

Toothy-mawed pteranodon,
A stegosaur who drags its tail,
Old T-Rex with no feathers on,
Dimetrodon with a humpy sail –
However much they’re wrong,
At least they never hem or hedge –
They’re always big and bold and cutting edge !

Pity the paleo-artists
Who bring these skeletons to life,
Who are the public midwife
To a thousand playground dreams –
No sooner have they started,
When a fossil or a paper
Is transforming facts to vapour
And is picking at the seams.

One day, in a century,
They’ll laugh at our sauropods
For not swimming in the sea –
No wonder how they look so odd…
No matter how carefully
We draw iguanodon his thumb,
We are the Crystal Palace beasts to come.

Pity the paleo-artists,
Their work is only for today –
For if they don’t give way,
Then their errors just persist.
But don’t be brash or heartless –
Their legacy is in the seeds
That captures, stimulates, and feeds
Each future dino-tologist.

Crystal Palace Iguanadons, sculpted by Benjamin Hawkins, photographed by Jes

No Cover, No Sample

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Photo by Mike on Pexels.com

No Cover, No Sample

Ev’ry thing I’ve ever heard is in me,
Running through me,
Lying low.
Ev’ry song and ev’ry word within me
Helps renew me,
Helps me grow.
I honour all who came before me,
Credit all who built my story –
Don’t forget and don’t ignore –
For without them, then I would not be me,
I’d have no core.
But all their work is cogitated,
Filtered, altered, complicated –
All I ever loved and hated,
Melts and bonds and stirs the pot of me
In which they pour.
Inspiration is no sin,
But make it ours, and make it new –
So add some flesh beneath the skin
And add some point of view.
All I saw and all I heard,
I freely borrow, freely quote –
But never, never word-for-word
Or note-for-note.

I’ve always wanted to call my record label NCNS records, for ‘no covers, no samples’ – and both would be banned, only putting out brand new songs.  But then again, there are numerous songs I adore that feature both, so I should watch what I say.

But on the subject of samples, can I have a quick grumble over the start of Two Tribes.  We hear Patrick Allen’s voice lifted directly from the Protect & Survive public information film, but they’ve chosen a very ungrammatical moment: “The air attack warning sounds like.  This is the sound.” Sounds like what, Patrick ?  And then his next sampled line (“When you hear the attack warning, you and your family must take cover…”) is cut-off before the final words (“…at once”), given a very abrupt cadence.  Are we to interpret this as the announcer being suddenly overwhelmed by the blast ?  These two sloppy bits editing have been bugging me since 1984...

Slow Poke

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Slow Poke

Never drop your tardigrade in alcohol or acid, when
It isn’t curled-up tightly like a bun.
Never dehydrate it, or stop its oxygen,
Until all of its shrivelling is done.
Never heat your tardigrade a hundred-plus degrees,
Or blast it with a gamma ray, or leave it out to freeze,
Or send it into space, or in a pressure fit to squeeze –
Unless it is a hibernating tun.
If it’s slowly, slowly moving,
Prob’ly best to leave it be –
For now is not the time for proving
Indestructibility.
For a tardy’s only hardy
When its legs no longer run…
But if it’s small and in a ball ?
Then sure, go have some fun.

Footloose

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Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

Footloose

Where do all my socks go
When a fresh set can’t be sourced ?
My pairs may start out married,
But they always end divorced –
Woollen-millers, stocking-fillers,
Full-of-holes or reinforced,
Longs and shorts and blacks and creams –
Like-and-like repel, it seems.
Many lonely-socks are sulking
Limp and curled-up on their tod –
Unloved, unworn, and dresser-skulking,
Each one well-and-truly odd.

Where do all my socks go ?
Onto other people’s feet ?
Too long in drawers they’ve tarried
Now they’re keen to up-and-meet –
They’re soc-hopping, garter-dropping, –
Long-legged jeans keep them discreet.
Sock it to ’em, just for kicks,
The silk, bamboo and cotton-mix.
Whenever mismatched-socks are strutting,
Are they going on a date ?
And when they’re balled-up, are they rutting,
Knitting booties with their mate ?

London Pebble

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London Pebble

I found a fossil in the park today –
An ammonite in iron grey,
Hardly rare, this type of fare,
They get found in their scores –
They all died by their millions
Till they died with the dinosaurs.

But all the rock round here today
Is built on London Clay –
On the scene in the Eocene,
With its lush and tropic shores,
Yet laid down some ten million
After the end of the dinosaurs.

I guess the path on which it sat
Was older than all that.
I guess its gravel had to travel
From who knows where, of course –
He’s an immigrant, like the millions
Coming here since the dinosaurs.

Though I suspect it’s less of an ammonite and more of a snail.

Abiblos

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Alas, this is another mystery as to who is the painter

Abiblos

The Greeks never had a canon,
Their gods were not in chapter and verse –
Despite a level of literacy,
They didn’t take gods literally.
Oh sure, they all believed in them,
As unavoidable (or worse),
But ev’ry city-state would give
A local spin to ev’ry myth.

The Greeks never had a canon,
Their gods made do with epic tales –
All unofficial, without guards,
And retold not by priests, but bards.
They probably believed in them,
But stuck their thumbs upon the scales –
As fan-fictions running free
That no-one saw as heresy.

The Greeks never had a canon,
Their gods were merely one of many –
Fighting ev’ry deity
For prayers and popularity.
Oh sure, the Greeks believed in them,
Yet outright-worshipped hardly any –
And who they did would change with fashion –
Sacrifices on a ration.

The Greeks never had a canon,
Their gods were tricky to pin down –
They changed their shapes and names at will
To stay alert and hard to kill.
If folks no more believed in them,
They merged with newer-gods-in-town –
So the Jews think just one god is best ?
Well, toss him on the altar with the rest.

End of the Line

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End of the Line

I’ve never been to Cockfosters –
What strange exotic waits me there ?
A land where roosters shelter chicks,
And spread the corn for all to share ?

I’ve never been to Ruislip West
Where ‘U’s are silent all the day,
Or Barnet High, the net of bars –
And what of Watford, anyway ?

I’ve never been to Edgeware’s edge,
That surely teeters on the void –
Or seen the walths of Walthamstow,
Or beckoned Beckton, overjoyed.

There’s Abbey Wood, the timber church –
That’s just a train away, I swear !
And Morden Moor, and Stoney Weald ?
They’re waiting for me, if I dare…

Nice Try, Aesop

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Like it says, 9 Aesop Fables by Antonio Frasconi

Nice Try, Aesop

The race ain’t always to the swift,
Nor the fight a cinch for the strong –
Though underdogs lose out nine in ten,
And the weak last half as long.
The race is won by the winner,
And the winner is usually fast –
The Hare can snooze all the afternoon,
But the Tortoise still comes last.

The point ain’t always with the smug,
Nor the sting a prod from the sharp –
And morals will lose us nine in ten
Whenever the pious harp.
The ears are won by the joker,
Who flatters more than he smarts –
The North Wind can bluster all he likes,
But the Sun will warm our hearts.

To the Baron

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Stratego Spy by Donato Giancola

To the Baron 

To the nicest baddie I ever knew –
Always cast as a goon or creep.
I guess you wear that air of menace,
Bringing class to the crass and cheap.
You’re not exactly anyone-for-tennis,
But behind those brooding eyes is something deep.
Your humour is too quirky
To belong to all these villains you engage –
Your smile is always lurking,
Yet you have to keep it hidden on the stage –
But your secret gentle side,
The one you hide behind your sneer,
Could not be more sincere
When off-duty and confided between friends.
You could have been a leading man
If fate had had a diff’rent plan –
But you were never one to follow trends.
And hey, at least you had some fun
With ev’ry yob and wayward son –
And even as they come undone,
Their mad, defiant laughter never ends.
I could go on, but I know you’re shy,
And I guess you get the gist –
So here’s to the sweetest bad guy
That I’ve ever booed and hissed !

I wrote this about a friend, you don’t know him, don’t let it bother you.

Unclip the Capo

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Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

Unclip the Capo

We discovered her
As she busked beneath an underpass –
Homeless, I believe,
But her singing was pure class –
Just the sweetest voice of waifdom
And a simply strummed guitar
And we saw a mutual benefit
In crafting her a star.

We set a mic before of her
And we let her sing her soul,
And marvelled at her innocence
Undimmed by cold and dole.
And as she left us weeping,
So she turned and said with half a grin
“I’d like to try all that again,
But this time plug me in.”

She blagged a beat-up Fender
And she risked a power chord,
And suddenly her eyes were bright
As if she’d seen the Lord.
She spidered up the neck and slid back down
With whammy and sustain,
And asked the box crank her up
With tremolo and gain.

So by the time of bass and drums,
We couldn’t well refuse.
But oh, where was our angel
In this devil with the blues ?
“It’s always sounded this way in my head”
She said, “That’s how it swings,
But I’ve only had two hands before,
And only had six strings.”