There’s some folks like the opera, And some who dig that jazz. There’s people whooping bluegrass, Or the brazen rasp of brass. But whatever rocks your socks Is cool with me.
Some days it seems my likings Are by ev’ryone despised – I’m unmoved by their pref’rences So eulogized and prized. But whatever dials your smiles Is cool with me.
There’s some folks like the one thing, And others love the other. Too rare we coincide, but slide To discord with our brother. But whatever peps your steps Is cool with me.
Always getting in our way, By stringing threads across our paths, Or playing statues on our carpets, Getting trapped inside our baths, Or hanging down from lightshades Or on wing-mirrors, left unchecked, Or guarding rarely-opened doors We never asked them to protect – Always forcing us to shoo them, Leaving webs that we must snap – No wonder we believe the lie That some get swallowed while we nap !
Always stinging beads of dew, And cupboard-lurking in surprise, Always scuttling just in view Of the very corners of our eyes – Yet when the flies are buzzing, buzzing, Where are they to shoot them down ? And all that silk as strong as steel, Yet can’t be farmed to spin a gown. Always raising jumps and squeals And relocated in alarm – No wonder we believe the lie That spiders only bring us harm.
Alfie O’Ryan is quite the star, With a name as bloated as he – Some call him Beetle Juice, Some call him Battle Geese, Lord knows what he was to Ptolemy.
And then there’s Wry Gull and Puppies in Booties, If I eat a careener, will it turn out Serious ? And do we get to call these, The Piss Keys and the Higher-D’s ? We need an Older Baron to make it less mysterious.
Well, how should they be pronounced ? We have to teach ourselves by the ounce – We read them in textbooks with no overseer, Just Awful Yuccas and Cassy O’Pier.
As I’ve detailed elsewhere, Betelgeuse was pretty much dead to Ptolemy. I have heard it suggested that he didn’t care for the fixed stars because they were, well, fixed – unlike his real passion, the wandering planets.
Show me a god, any god, before me, And I’ll wrestle him wrath to the ground – I’ll grapple his incorporeal might, I’ll douse his strange and ineffable light. Bring me a god, any god, before me, And I’ll leave him imploded and bound – I’ll haul him before the judgement of Hague, To count for each smiting and censure and plague.
Hey, have you seen this ? Chillis give us allergies !, I watched it on The One Show and I read it in The Mail. Never mind the experts – they claim our claims are fallacies, Yet we know how we feel – and we’re feeling rather frail.
Hey, have you caught this ? Cucumbers cause impotence !, I found it on the internet – it’s all there if you dig. So much for ‘mostly water’ ! That’s Big Salad’s influence, They pump them full of chemicals – that’s how they grow so big !
Hey, have you scoped this ? Sweetcorn gives us cancer ! I heard it at a coffee-shop, and in a waiting room. So sure, go ahead, if you want to be a chancer, But know I told you so when those yellow lumps bring doom.
Hey, have you shared this, at Waitrose or Pilates? Let’s spread the word and spread the fad, and let our bodies heal. Let’s get some trendy diets at the nation’s dinner parties, Then maybe I won’t have to taste those bastards ev’ry meal !
The trouble with a drum machine Is that it hasn’t got an ego, Trouble with a drum machine Is that it always keeps in time: The fourth beat goes where the first three go, As do the crash and click and chime. Ev’ry beat created Is so beautifully weighted And it comes along precisely When a beat’s anticipated. Yes, some settings let it swing (In a very predictable way), But at its heart, it can only play As its programming dictates – It has no art in how it syncopates. From the moment we press start, It serves up static jazz and bluesless blues At gridline rates – And despite what the singer would choose. It can’t insist on using toms or gates. However loud, however smart, It never tries to build its part, With never a roll and never a fill – It just keeps beating, Beat-beat-beating, Beating on and on until At last the plug is pulled, the button pushed, The damn thing overruled and hushed, And finally each tireless brush and stick is still. The trouble with a drum machine From marching boys to charging pop, Is knowing when to make a noise, And knowing when to stop.
Halfway between the Tube and the office, I pass them each morning, sat on a front-garden wall. I pass them on neither a side street or high street – They watch us commuters, but we barely see them at all.
On always the same wall (perhaps it’s their own wall) – With placards and Bibles, but no blood and brimstone, they sit. I guess they’re a couple, I guess they’re retired, But what do I know ?- we haven’t yet talked, I admit.
For I have no int’rest in what they are selling, Though they’re barely selling, and no-one is buying it seems. But better by far their quiet shop-window Than Loud-Hailer Preacher, who stands by the station and screams.
Photo by Miguel u00c1. Padriu00f1u00e1n on Pexels.com
Who’da Thunk It ?
Verbs in English are really German In how they like to behave – Especially when irregular, Which helps explain how give gives gave. So when a Norman interloper Such as catch is gadding about Well, either its past sees it catched up in logic, Or its sneaky imitation has caught us out. The way they are is how they evolved, And they’re simply something that must be learned. Yet even today, the strong turn weak, As learnt is ousted by the friendlier learned. Snuck may have sneaked in recently, But verbs have become less fraught – Where once they flied-out and grandstood, now Their work’s less overwrought.
Whenever someone is keen to stress That money can’t buy happiness, Just take a look at their mode of dress: Are they all stained and dishevelled and reeking, Threadbare of t-shirt and rumpled of slacks, And sporting the Houses of Primark and T K Maxx ? Or are they rather more sharp and bespoke in their speaking, In voices never broken or cracked ?
The fact is that we all of us can sleep a little better When we never have to fret about just where we’re gonna sleep, Or we have to listen-out at ev’ry daybreak for that letter That we need to hide away before our kids can catch a peep, Or pretending that we cannot hear the scritching of the mice, Or the buzzing of mosquios, or the growing of the mould, Or the dripping from the ceiling that we’ve told the landlord twice, Or the asthma of our children, or their shivers in the cold, Or the mischief of the local youths that’s more than just a lark, Or another bloody car alarm, or couple’s blazing row, Or the rumours of a stalker whose been seen about the park, Or the…wasn’t that a gunshot that I dreamt I heard just now ? Or just dreading ev’ry time when there is someone comes a-knocking That it’s possibly the bailiffs or the summons to the court. Or perhaps it’s just the thought that we no longer find this shocking, Or that were the worst to happen, then we’ve next-to-no support.
I suppose they’re right, down deep, That money and greed can lead to excess, And it sometimes becomes a trap, I guess. But enough for a good night’s sleep ? I’d call that happiness.
February, when the end of Winter Greets the first of the start of Spring – And what better time for the ravens to be mating, For these early birds to be doing their thing ? Valentine ravens, tender and dear – They’re mating-for-life for year after year.
Coming out of the edges of the wilderness, From the Northern moors to the middle-class downs – Now nobody persecutes their loving anymore, So they do it in the open and they do it in the towns. Valentine ravens, cawing their love – A far better symbol than a bear-cub or a dove.
Rhyming Couplets 