postcards
from when you were away
are all I have left
to remind me
I never could read your writing
Archives for May 2011
Postcards
May 12, 2011 by
I want pickled garlic for breakfast
May 12, 2011 by
Inspired (as ever) by the lovely Olivia whose thought this was,
and her mum Eleanor who told us about it …
I want pickled garlic for breakfast
I’ve made it quite clear to my Mum
That she has to get it off Daddy
And I get to eat Allium
My brother has ate all my glitter
My Daddy is hoarding his food
Now Charlie’s a sparklier shitter
And Mum says I’m not to be crude
I said “I just want pickled garlic
Come on Mum it can’t be that hard”
But she went and sided with Daddy
I tried grabbing the jar but was barred
My parents are terribly liberal
Politically they’re both right on
When it comes to my rights over brekkie
I’m telling you though it’s a con
My Mum says I can’t steal the garlic
She’d find out that I had with her nose
It’s olfactory my dear Watson
In the Case of the Lost Stinking Rose
I want pickled garlic for breakfast
I know it sounds bourgeois to say
It’s lack of the pickle that ails me
As I eat my petit dejeuner
Why Can’t My Life be a Musical ?
May 12, 2011 by
Artwork by the talented dog lover, Erik K
For Sophie, whose question this was
I wish my life was a musical
Or something even better
Some G and S would be the best
My life ? The Operetta.
I wish my life was a musical
Not this complicated thing
I don’t want to trudge this weary path
I want to dance and sing
In musicals no spots pop out
When the heroine’s had a snog,
The hero never farts at all
Or leaves the seat up on the bog.
When they’re looking for an answer
To a thorny problem-ette
They just sing and then a dancer
Does a lovely pirouette –
and before you know what’s happened
There’s no problem any more !
The thing that was wrong was solved in the song
Whilst swooshing across the floor
In a musical, the good bits
(& I’d like a few of these)
are repeated for you later
In a wonderful reprise.
The sad bit in the middle
The bit the makes you want to weep
Is cancelled out by lovely things
And the hunk you get to keep !
So You up there in heaven
Don’t you sit there being fickle
Get off your arse and help me fast
Create this new mu-sickle !
And I’m not just in the chorus
Singing Alto ‘cause I can …
I wanna be the leading lady,
I wanna pick my leading man
I wish my life was a musical
I want to live life, not just doze it
And through good or ill, I’ll remember still
It is my show – I composed it.
Trampoline
May 12, 2011 by
For George, the best godson in the very long history of godsons
On the occasion of Michael and Andrea’s wedding
I went to my auntie’s last weekend
‘cos my cousin got married you see
that isn’t as odd or as strange as it sounds
‘cos he’s quite a bit older than me
In the garden they had a contraption
for torturing boys of my size
It looked like a table with mats on
and springs all attached at the sides
In the middle the surface was rubber
It was flat and looked stable to me
I turned and I smiled to my brudder
His eyes glinted malevolently
“It’s a trampoline George” said my brother
but I couldn’t quite fathom his meaning
I knew perfectly well how to trample
but I’d never done trampling whilst leaning
Now let me put this in perspective
I’m one and a bit, nearly two
Imagine my horror when Mummy elected
to join in with torturing me too
She lifted me onto the surface
It seemed to be soft under bum
I stood up (I’m getting quite good at that now)
and I started to walk towards Mum
Imagine my shock when the rubber
Gave way when I started to walk
and then shot up and launched me right into the sky
like a blond haired blue eyed champagne cork
But gravity’s no laughing matter
It brought me back down to the mat
before flipping me up like a coin being tossed
I went base over apex and then Splat!
When the bouncing stopped I was erratic
I walked like Dad’s Wonston Arms friend
And the rubber had filled me with static
and my hair was all standing on end
The Prestonic Piddler
May 12, 2011 by
My sister in law was very, very not drunk at all on holiday, when she revealed to the assembled masses that she sent her husband down the garden to wee on the compost
Can I have a quick word in your ear ?
(I have) something to tell you you see
My brother in law makes urea
and enriches his compost with wee
He sneaks down the garden at midnight
It must be in darkness I think
and he climbs up the mountain of compost
having had lots of water to drink
Their tea bags and potato peelings
Old newspapers, rotting and faded
Are all piled in a heap
Onto which Presto leaps
Just waiting to be biodegraded
His experience shows, he’s sure footed
He don’t tumble, or slide – never slips
He just stands there astride his leftovers
And confidently starts to unzip
He unleashes the Prestonic Piddler
The wondrous pride of the nation
Cometh Mark, cometh hour
He lets loose a great shower
Of nitrate enriched irrigation
Spider Plant
May 12, 2011 by
To the tune of ‘Spiderman’
Spider plant, spider plant,
Copies spiders ? Well, no, it can’t.
Spends all day sat in pots
Doesn’t get ’round a lot
Watch out!
Slow moving spider plant.
Is it wrong ? It lives in mud
It’s got radial active buds
Spin a web ? Never has
Doesn’t do all that jazz
Hey there,
it’s just a spider plant
Though it’s got no eyes, it’s a genius with light
Photosynthesizing (but never at night)
Spider plant, spider plant
Capture evil ones ? No it can’t
Criminals it won’t fight ’em
Cos’ it’s a Chlorophtyum
It’s there, just sitting in the corner
It’s flora it’s not fauna
You’ll find the spider plant !
Richard and The French Cow Crisis
May 12, 2011 by
An emergency happened one morning
And nobody seems to know how
A garden which should have been empty
Was suddenly filled up with cow
The cows were all eating the flowers
Bovine Petit Dejeuner
They must have been in there for hours
How they got there no-one could say
We sent for our own master herder
Who herded up all of the boys
(Well really he just screamed blue murder
and woke them up with all the noise)
Their present for Jacques that morning
Wasn’t gold, wasn’t silver or cash
Instead what they gave him that caused him to smile
Was a garden quite empty of vache
On being punctuated
May 12, 2011 by
The swordsman delivered a /
though I tried to run I could not —
my : was sliced
into ; twice
I fell down to the floor with a crash
though I tried to run I could not —
my : was sliced
into ; twice
I fell down to the floor with a crash
Now I was @ Death’s door it seemed
Not too long ~ end of my dreams
Neither stick now or ^
Could prevent all this claret
I had fallen apart at the seams
Not too long ~ end of my dreams
Neither stick now or ^
Could prevent all this claret
I had fallen apart at the seams
My Dad’s Job and Other Important Things
May 12, 2011 by
For George, the finest godson since the invention of godsons
My father’s an eminent sailor,
though I’m not sure what eminent means
I think it’s his work clothes are tailored
and he doesn’t commute wearing jeans
His hair’s short and straight, it’s not wavy
it’s not spiked up or permed, it’s not curled
‘cos you have to be smart in the Navy
when you’re travelling all ‘round the world.
My Dad says he’s sailed the ocean
But the ships these days haven’t got sails
There’s engines that give the ship motion
It isn’t reliant on gales
He once said he ‘steamed’ into port but
he wouldn’t explain it, he weaselled
I don’t think there’s steam engines now though
But it just sounds wrong when you say ‘dieselled’
I’ve sailed with my Dad – in a dinghy
It’s quite like a frigate, but smaller
I’d quite like to captain the warship
but my Dad says you have to be taller
My Dad says it’s war every Thursday
when they’re training the Captains at sea
In the city, Mum says, war is five days a week
Which sounds a lot harder to me
In the city though guns aren’t encouraged
The only shells you see come with your lunch
and I’d rather fire salvos of missiles and rockets
than worry about credit going ‘crunch’
For now though there are things more important
Affairs of great import to me
Like isn’t it time we got a puppy ?
And what am I having for tea ?
Look over there
May 12, 2011 by
For Mikey at bedtime
Look over there
What can we see ?
The whole wide world
as far as the trees
There’s a giant giraffe
eating bamboo
and a very tall ostrich
that is six foot two
Look over there
What can we see ?
The whole wide world
as far as the trees
There’s the garden next door
and the one after that
and sneaking up the path
is a naughty little cat
Look over there
What can we see ?
The whole wide world
as far as the trees
There’s a crocodile swimming
‘cross a river of blue
and up in the branches
there’s a squirrel – no ! Two !
Look over there
What can we see ?
The whole wide world
as far as the trees
Then right above the treetops
Can you see in the sky ?
The marshmallow mountains
of clouds flying by
Look over there
What can we see ?
The whole wide world
as far as the trees
Now Mummy draws the curtains
from the left and from the right
and the garden and the trees
have all vanished from sight
Look over there
What can we see ?
The whole wide world:
Mum and you and me.