Collected Poems Page 12

  Lacking a desert, he wandered

  on Blackheath for 40 days

  and 40 nights before being

  arrested by two pharisees

  in a panda car. ‘Father,

  forgive them,’ he said.

  And father, a door-to-door

  used toupée salesman from Lewisham

  did.

  Cousin Fiona

  Cousin Fiona

  from near the top drawer

  is a blueblood donor

  and Kensington bore.

  A moderate showjumper

  plain and weakwilled

  Cousin Fiona

  is never fulfilled.

  For what she wants

  but will never admit

  is a man to take her by the bit.

  Someone to

  jog with

  snog with

  look in her eyes

  canter

  banter

  romanticize

  Someone to

  lead her

  to pastures new

  someone to

  share her

  pony-made-for-two.

  And Fiona sleeps in a saddlesoaped room

  and dreams of a pinstripe-jodhpured groom

  and crop in hand, she gallops into moonlit gymkhanas

  to ride gentleshod over her sinning nude

  sinewed broncoing buck

  giddyup giddyup giddy up up up.

  And Fiona weeps after her lonely ride

  always the bridle, never the bride.

  Big Arth

  Big Arth from Penarth

  was a forward and a half.

  Though built like a peninsula

  with muscles like pink slagheaps

  and a face like a cheese grater

  he was as graceful and fast

  as a greased cheetah.

  A giraffe in the lineout

  a rhino in the pack

  he never passed forward

  when he should’ve passed back

  and once in possession

  slaalomed his way

  through the opposition.

  And delicate?

  Once for a lark

  at Cardiff Arms Park

  Big Arth

  converted a softboiled egg

  from the halfway line.

  No doubt about it,

  he was one of the best players in the second team.

  Accrington Stan

  A more talented footballer

  Never ran on a pitch

  Than Accrington Stan

  Who might have been rich.

  He could pass a ball

  He could score a goal

  (But he couldn’t pass a betting-shop

  So now he’s on the dole).

  The Hon. Nicholas Frayn

  The Hon. Nicholas Frayn

  who threw the javelin

  would always travelin

  a chauffeur-driven plane.

  He somewhat lacked a chin

  but always threw to win

  and was notoriously vain.

  He used only monogrammed javelins

  sapphire-tipped and silver-plated

  and was rated good enough to win his blue.

  One day at a meeting in Crewe

  he tripped and ran himself through

  and though bleeding profusely

  from a wound in his side

  carried on gamely to finish next to last.

  Then died.

  Aunty Ann

  Aunty Ann

  an anti-angler

  would dangle a

  dead herring

  on the end of a line.

  A warning sign

  to fishes

  that man could be

  vicious.

  Not a popular figure

  among the coarse

  fishing crowd

  she was found floating

  one morning

  in the river near Stroud.

  At the memorial service

  in an underwater church

  the mourners were grayling

  chub and perch,

  salmon, pike and trout

  who prayed, wet-eyed

  then drifted out

  to witness above

  a heavenly banquet.

  De profundis one by one

  Temptation proved too great

  Like angels falling into the sun

  they rose, and took the bait.

  Uncle Leo

  Uncle Leo’s sole ambition

  was to be a liontamer

  so he enrolled for classes at nightschool

  and practised at home on his wife.

  Aunt Elsa at first had reservations

  but having once acquired

  a taste for raw meat and the lash

  she came on by leaps and bounds.

  And after only 6 months

  Uncle Leo announced with some pride

  that his wife had opened her mouth

  and he’d put his head inside.

  One afternoon, however

  while he was changing the sawdust

  in the bathroom, Aunt Elsa escaped

  mauled 2 boy scouts and a traffic warden

  before being captured by the RSPCA.

  Now a tamed Uncle Leo, give him his due

  visits her daily at Regent’s Park Zoo.

  Uncle Len

  Uncle Len

  a redundant gamekeeper

  strangled cuckoos.

  He didn’t give a f—whose

  c—oos

  he strangled

  as long as he silenced

  as many as he could.

  Last March in Bluebell Wood

  while reaching for the season’s

  first feathered victim

  he fell forty feet

  broke his neck

  and screaming,

  unwittingly heralded spring.

  Elmer Hoover

  Elmer Hoover

  on vac from

  Vancouver

  went fishing

  off the Pier Head.

  He caught 2 dead rats

  dysentery

  and a shoal of slimywhite balloonthings

  which he brought home in a jamjar.

  ‘Mersey cod,’ we told him.

  So he took the biggest

  back to Canada.

  Had it stuffed, mounted,

  and displayed over the fireplace

  in his trophy room.

  ‘But you shudda seen

  the one that got away,’

  he would say.

  Nonplussing his buddies.

  Uncle Jed

  Uncle Jed

  Durham bred

  raced pigeons

  for money.

  He died

  a poor man

  however

  as the pigeons

  were invariably

  too quick for him.

  Cousin Daisy

  Cousin Daisy’s

  favourite sport

  was standing

  on streetcorners.

  She contracted

  with ease

  a funny disease.

  Notwithstanding.

  Cousin Nell

  Cousin Nell

  married a frogman

  in the hope

  that one day

  he would turn into

  a handsome prince.

  Instead he turned into

  a sewage pipe

  near Gravesend

  and was never seen again.

  Footy Poem

  I’m an ordinary feller six days of the week

  But Saturday turn into a football freak.

  I’m a schizofanatic, sad but it’s true

  One half of me’s red, and the other half’s blue.

  I can’t make me mind up which team to support

  Whether to lean to starboard or port

  I’d be bisexual if I had time for sex

  Cos it’s G
oodison one week and Anfield the next.

  But the worst time of all is Derby day

  One half of me’s at home and the other’s away

  So I get down there early in me usual place

  With me rainbow scarf and me two-tone face.

  And I’m shouting for Liverpool, the Reds can’t lose

  ‘Come on de Everton’ – ‘Gerrin dere Blues’

  ‘Use yer winger’ – ‘Worra puddin’

  ‘King of der Kop’ – All of a sudden – Wop!

  ‘Goal!’ – ‘Offside!’

  And after the match as I walk back alone

  It’s argue, argue all the way home

  Some nights when I’m drunk I’ve even let fly

  An given meself a poke in the eye.

  But in front of the fire watchin’ ‘Match of the Day’

  Tired but happy, I look at it this way:

  Part of me’s lost and part of me’s won

  I’ve had twice the heartaches – but I’ve had twice the fun.

  Is My Team Playing

  (after A. E. Housman)

  Is my team playing

  That I used to cheer

  Each Saturday on the terrace

  Before I transferred here?

  Aye the lads still battle

  They go from strength to strength

  Won the FA Cup

  Since you were laid at length.

  Is factory still closed

  With pickets at the gate?

  Would I could lend a hand

  Ere I felt the hand of Fate.

  No things are back to normal

  Thanks to the TUC

  Our wages now are frozen

  But not so much as thee.

  And my lonely widow

  Does she nightly grieve

  For her dear departed

  Gone early to the grave?

  No she’s right as rain

  And not the one to weep

  She is well looked after

  Be still my lad, and sleep.

  And what of you, dear friend

  Are you still unwed

  Or have you found a lady

  To share your bachelor bed?

  Well… er, I don’t know how to say this

  But after the funeral I got really plastered

  I walked the widow back to yours, and

  Oh, you lousy b*stard!

  Poem for the opening of Christ the King Cathedral, Liverpool, 1967

  O Lord on thy new Liverpool address

  let no bombs fall

  Gather not relics in the attic

  nor dust in the hall

  But daily may a thousand friends

  who want to chat just call

  Let it not be a showroom

  for wouldbe good Catholics

  or worse:

  a museum

  a shrine

  a concrete hearse

  But let it be a place

  Where lovers meet after work

  for kind words and kisses

  Where dockers go of a Saturday night

  to get away from the missus

  Tramps let kip there through till morning

  kids let rip there every evening

  Let us pray there

  heads held high

  arms to the sky

  not afraid and kneeling

  let Koppites

  teach us how to sing

  God’s ‘Top of the Pops’ with feeling

  After visiting you

  May trafficwardens let noisy parkers off

  and policemen dance on the beat

  Barrowomen knock a shilling off

  exatheists sing in the street

  And let the cathedral laugh

  Even show its teeth

  And if it must wear the cassock of dignity

  Then let’s glimpse the jeans beneath

  O Lord on thy new Liverpool address

  let no bombs fall

  Keep always a light in the window

  a welcome mat in the hall

  That it may be a home sweet

  home from home for all.

  In Two Minds

  What I love about night

  is the silver certainty of its stars

  What I hate about stars

  is the overweening swank of their names

  What I love about names

  is that every complete stranger has one

  What I hate about one

  is the numerical power it wields over its followers

  What I love about followers

  is the unseemly jostle to fill the footsteps

  What I hate about footsteps

  is the way they gang up in the darkness

  What I love about darkness

  is the soft sighing of its secrets

  What I hate about secrets

  is the excitement they pack into their short lives

  What I love about lives

  is the variety cut from the same pattern

  What I hate about pattern

  is its dull insistence on conformity

  What I love about conformity

  is the seed of rebelliousness within

  What I hate about within

  is the absence of landscape, the feel of weather

  What I love about weather

  is its refusal to stay in at night

  What I hate about night

  is the silver certainty of its stars

  crusader

  in bed

  like a dead

  crusader

  arms a

  cross my chest

  i lie

  eyes closed

  listening

  to the body’s glib mechanics

  ***

  on the street

  outside

  men of violence

  quarrel.

  Their drunken voices

  dark weals

  on the

  glistening

  back of the night.

  Catching up on Sleep

  i go to bed early

  to catch up on my sleep

  but my sleep

  is a slippery customer

  it bobs and weaves

  and leaves

  me exhausted. It

  side steps my clumsy tackles.

  with ease. Bed

  raggled I drag

  myself to my knees.

  The sheep are countless

  I pretend to snore

  yearn for chloroform

  or a sock on the jaw

  body sweats heart beats

  there is Panic in the Sheets

  until

  as dawn slopes up the stairs

  to set me free

  unawares

  sleep catches up on me

  vampire

  Blood is an acquired taste

  ‘tis warm and sickly

  and sticks to the teeth

  a surfeit makes me puke.

  I judge my victims as a connoisseur

  a sip here, a mouthful there.

  I never kill

  and am careful to cause no pain

  to those who sleeping nourish me

  and calling once I never call again.

  So if one morning you awake,

  stretch, and remember

  dark dreams of

  falling

  falling

  if your neck is sore

  a mark that wasn’t there the night before

  be not afeared ’tis but a sign

  i give thee thanks

  i have drunk thy wine.

  warlock poems

  Nocturne

  Unable to sleep.

  Every sound an enemy,

  each stirring an intruder.

  Even my own breathing

  is frisked

  before being allowed out.

  I suffer during darkness

  a thousand bludgeonings,

  see blood everywhere.

  How my poor heartr />
  dreads the night

  shift. I wear

  a smear of sweat

  like a moist plastercast.

  Adrift in a monstered sea.

  Those actors who scare so well

  in your nightmares

  have all practised first on me.

  exsomnia

  in bed

  counting sheep

  my attention

  distracted by

  a passing nude

  when suddenly

  a hoof

  caught me

  on the head

  with a soft moan I collapsed

  now i lie

  by the bed

  side more dead

  than alive

  waiting for the

  somnambulance

  to arrive

  ofa sunday

  ofa sunday

  the only thing

  i burn

  at both ends

  is my bacon.

  Like the tele

  phone i am

  off the hook

  i watch the

  newspapers for

  hours & browse

  through T.V.

  miss mass

  and wonder

  if mass

  misses me

  italic

  ONCE I LIVED IN CAPITALS

  MY LIFE INTENSELY PHALLIC

  but now i’m sadly lowercase

  with the occasional italic

  Scintillate

  I have outlived

  my youthfulness

  So a quiet life for me.

  Where once

  I used to

  scintillate

  now I sin

  till ten