So you say you don’t like my fill-in-the-blank, Well okay grandad, off you trot, So you think my taste is ‘square’ and ‘rank’, Well God bless you and off you trot, And love what you love and leave what you don’t, And tell what you will and spare what you won’t, But if you can’t wait to gossip what you hate, Well groovy, daddy-o, off you trot, Don’t let me stop you, but hold on there, Just let me work out how much I care While I crank my fav’rit song upto ten – WHAT’S THAT ? SAY WHAT ? COME AGEN ? You were prob’ly calling it a ‘din’ and ‘rot’ Cos these days, whinging’s all you got – So I guess you don’t like the whole ‘darn’ lot, But don’t worry, geezer, off you trot.
Nothing to do with the poem, I just thought it a curious name for a nail-polish.
Scanning the Last Words of Lines
Street, white, hand, song – No rhymes there, best move along. Roots, come, page, near – Shan’t be lurking long ’round here. Found, sharp, luck, role – Nothing there to lurch my soul. Pen, sighed, when, tide – Go on then, I’ll take a ride.
Here comes Abigail, Searching for the Holy Grail – She looks for it in Mark and Luke, She looks for it in John But once she sees it’s all a fluke She learns what’s going on.
Abigail, Abigail, Making all the rabbis wail, Making all the imams hush, Making all the vicars blush.
Here comes Abigail, Grabbing scripture by the tail – Tearing through the Psalms and Acts, Incase it’s all a con – She’s chasing down elusive facts To suss what’s going on.
Abigail, Abigail, Making all the abbés quail, Making all the prophets cry, And simply by her asking “why ?”
Poets: we’re never too subtle or shy – We’re big on the drama, on even the small days. The all-knowing pen of the all-seeing I, In the first-person first, and last, and always. With a couchful of angst and a sleeveful of heart, We splinter all meaning, we trample all art – For we are the masters of words, And are well-worth the fuss. Depend upon it, from old boy to upstart – For all of our sonnets to lovers and birds, Our verses are all about us.
How do we know How we know what we know ?, When we haven’t a clue How we do what we do ? And how do we think When we think in a blink ? In a faster-than-short, We have caught us a thought. They hustle and tout And they wheedle and shout, Like rumours and tracts That have somehow crept out – Till we realise there’s mountains of facts That we swear we weren’t taught.
I do not know How I know what I know, But I know that they flow As they come and they go. Cos there’s stuff I’ve forgot – Don’t know what, but a lot – And there’s thoughts that will sow, Lying low till they grow, And they scatter and spread Through my depths of my head As factoids and fluff That take root and embed. Till I realise there’s jungles of stuff That I happen to know.
The first to blossom was Daisy, Yet still a rather homely lass – Though pretty in a common way, She spent all year within the grass
The next to blossom was Iris, Bursting out in the warming Spring – Showy, delicate, desirous, Over quickly – just a fling.
The next to blossom was Poppy, A gothic girl in crimson red – A heady mix of sharp and soppy, Fascinated by the dead.
The next to blossom was Rosie, A redhead maid with cheeks of pink – Nothing about her was boring or prosy, And lasting longer than you’d think.
The next to blossom was Heather, Just as the leaves were starting to turn – Sturdy and tough, whatever the weather, And hiding a heart just waiting to burn.
The last to blossom was Ivy, Much maligned, but on the climb – Her bauble buds were small though lively, Coming of age at Christmastime.
The office upstairs is pristine-abandoned, Glimpsed through the lift-lobby windows – Paperless desks and clutter-free intrays, Silent printers sulking in rows. Phones unringing, chairs unswiv’ling, Three-speed fans no longer swishing – Out of business ? But it looks so peaceful, Like they’ve chosen to all go fishing. They might come tomorrow, but probably won’t. So what do they know that the other floors don’t ?
How far into the Autumn dare we edge Without a proper coat ? Using jackets and jumpers as a bridge To keep our hopes afloat – Pretending the Summer is lurking still Whenever the morning’s bright, But getting caught by an unexpected chill That serves us right. And yet, if we just keep moving about On the sunny side of the street, It’s almost warm enough for going out In the dying heat. So please, just one more week before we don Our bulky Winter coats, When the pre-frost tingle says that the Summer’s gone, And the tardy North Wind gloats.
I would build a monument within Saint Peter’s, Rome – A monument to martyrs who preached heresy. Who stood by their convictions when tortured and alone On principals of science and philosophy. I would build a monument to passions unafraid When Quisitors would dowse the light they shined. Their sacrifice was equal to that which Jesus made – They gave their lives to save all humankind.
Bringing Juvelilia Week Part 2 to a close (there will be no Part 3, thankfully) is a poem inspired by Giordano Bruno, a fore-runner to Galileo and proponent of Copernican theory – who was tried, tortured and burned by the Flat-Earthers in the Catholic Church.
Apologists claim that his crime was heresy, not sol-centrism, and as late as 2000 (According to Wikipedia) Cardinal Angelo Sodano said of his inquisitors that they “had the desire to serve freedom and promote the common good and did everything possible to save his life” – well, everything short of not actually burning him at the stake, anyway. And Pope John-Paul the Second lamented “the use of violence that some have committed in the service of truth”, so that’s all right then, no harm no foul.
Incidentally, the statue above (on the very spot of his pyre) by Ettore Ferrari is from 1889and paid for by the local Freemasons as a deliberate middle finger to the then-Pope, who I won’t bother to name. (Wow, who’d’a’thunk I’d ever have anything positive to say about Freemasons ?) Its plaque contains the words Il Secolo Da Lui Divinato (From The Age That He Predicted), which is a line that any poet would be proud of, though I don’t know why it also labels our Giordano as ‘A Bruno’ – surely he was The Bruno…
Rhyming Couplets 