Tag: comedy

Why I ended up (for a while) in Hull, by Janet Sillett


By Robert Garnham

Why I ended up (for a while) in Hull

My group of friends read Larkin aloud
skiving off hockey,
outliers in a school
which dished out piety at 9am

We admired his contrariness,
dirty words,
and suburban weariness,
his constipated ennui

Larkin inspired me to study
in a god forsaken east coast city
a shared terrace with a parrot
a bath in the kitchen
on Anlaby Road

I skulked in vain in the library,
until we parted company abruptly,
Hull, Larkin and me
I moved on, as they say,
to Plath, Stevens, Crane
to a concrete place of learning,
and Larkin expressed his adoration
for Margaret Thatcher

I reread his poems, when living
in bedsits, in semis,
in the disillusionment of marriage

But let’s face it,
Larkin was a bigot, racist, serial snob
I want to see them starving,
the so-called working class
nostalgic for the good old days
when only white men played cricket for England

Consumer of pornography
(but never in the library)
composer of sado­masochistic reveries
shared to fellow man poets
posh adolescents fumbling with themselves
in bedrooms after lights out

I want to cancel Larkin
unknow his life,
his pervasion of archetypal Englishness
I settle for drowning in his poetry
with fingers in my ears

PS Apologies to Hull which I now think is a great place.

Janet Sillett recently took up writing poetry and short fiction again after decades of absence. She has had poems published in the Galway Advertiser, Poetry Plus magazine and Spilling Cocoa over Martin Amis, and flash fiction in Litro. She works for a think tank.

 

Ode to a Pee Funnel, by Christine Fowler


By Robert Garnham

Ode to a Pee Funnel

Alan’s caravan was the apple of his eye
It was a 1979 beauty
And only ←———-→ this wide
It had nowt of this modern rubbish
It was retro through and through
But there was one adaptation
He was really proud to use
It was a plastic funnel
Set up at just the right height
And the circumference you know
Was really not to tight
With wiggle room to spare
So when he stood there
And let it all hang out
There was only sound of running ‘water’
And moans of delight
And when the last drops were shaken
And everything tucked back in place
He was often heard to murmur
That’s a cracking thing I’ve made.

Christine Fowler was in her 60’s, when she began focussing on writing and performing poetry in autumn 2019 and published in journals and anthologies since 2020. Her poems are informed from a life time of experience of working with people in challenging situations. https://www.christinefowlerpoetry.com Instagram@christine.fowler.poetry

 

The camera never lies, by Sarah J Bryson


By Robert Garnham

The camera never lies

Take off your rucksack, it’ll spoil the image.
Here I’ll watch over it. Can you pull the scarf straight?
Zip up your jacket. That’s it, turn your face
so that it catches the sun. No – I can’t take it yet.
There’s a whole family in the way having their fun.
Just wait. Stay there. it won’t be long
before they are out of shot.

Damn. Now the sun’s gone. Hang on. It’ll be back soon.
There’s a strand of hair … can you pin it down?
Now. Are you ready? Look this way…without squinting?
Yes, I know it’s straight into the sun. Look away,
then I’ll give you a count…. One, two three, ready:
chin up, that’s it. Now smile.

Sarah J Bryson
Bio: Sarah has poems published in print journals, anthologies and on line. She has been a regular participant, during the Covid pandemic, in a weekly on-line arts event, combining photographs with haiku style poetry and has recently had several poems on the Poetry and Covid site.

 

Grumbles, by Amanda Baker


By Robert Garnham

Grumbles

I don’t want air treacle in my nostrils
a sullen clot of exhaustion in my stomach
sending spider webs of weakness through my veins
as I trudge up the hill.

I don’t want the miniature catgut squeal
of mosquitoes behind my right ear
to brush its crushed body off my upper arm
as I flail at the soft hollow behind my knee
driven in from my twilight garden.

I don’t want to stretch my fingers to relax
after clenching the steering wheel for thirteen hours
trapped between the swaying container walls
yellow blue and white barely visible in the torrential rain
as useless goods get transported across Europe
in response to an impulsive click on the tick box.

I want to be Legolas,
dancing lightly through ancient lichen-hung forests,
intact ecological webs singing their joy,
untouched by wildfires, beetles and drought.

Amanda Baker is based in Berlin. As a scientist, teacher, and animal physiotherapist, she loves exploring new ideas. She has had performances in KlinkerdIn, the Curious Fox and Over the Edge and has poems published in Automatic Pilot, Poethead and Strukturriss. She thoroughly enjoys Kevin Higgins’ Poetry workshops.

 

The Tale of Little Red Riding Hood, by Trisha Broomfield


By Robert Garnham

The Tale of Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf in Night Attire ( with apologies to Charles Perrault who probably wrote the original story in 1697)

‘Ah but just feel that cloth, the quality, the cut.’
Red Riding Hood noticed the glint in his eye
as the wolf’s hot, bad breath crept round her pale neck,
‘That’s one piece of clothing I simply must buy.’

‘It’s an heirloom,’ she said, with a vital step back,
‘belonged to my grandma who, if it wasn’t for you
would be waiting for me in this very bed.’
The wolf grinned, ‘but sweetie, it’s just me instead.’

‘I’m not at all sure’, Red Riding Hood said,
‘I should be sharing this feast with somone like you,
there’s a quiche in this basket and I know for a fact
that the canis lupis (and I suspect that you are), doesn’t eat that

‘Oh silly Red Hood, don’t be so unsure, we have changed
over years of the telling of tales, we eat quinoa, and eggs
you can trust me to share your fine basket of wares,
we even’, he murmured, ‘eat most things with legs.’

‘Take your hand of my quiche you ravenous beast,
and look what you’ve done to my cloak
where is my grandma? You must think I’m dim.’
‘There’s room for one more in this bed, do come in.’

‘You’re joking,’ she said, I’m just not that sort
and you’ve not had a haircut or shave
I’m taking my wares and my very fine cloak
I’ll leave you the food; perhaps with some luck you will choke.

‘But sweetie you must see that all through my life
and the length of this very fine tale
I’ve been waiting for you, it’s predestined, it’s fate!’
And the poor girl became the last thing that he ate.

 

I am the Genie in the Jar, by Mandy Beattie


By Robert Garnham

I AM THE GENIE IN THE JAR

A wee glass jar with a maroon lid
is an insect-tent, it sits
on a shelf watching the sunflower
clock’s second hand scurry
on yard thick walls of stone
the wee glass jar peers down
above, around and spots a ballerina
in a white tutu and pink tap shoes
on a white wall waiting for Genie
to lift the maroon lid
to flit and look for ladybirds, spiders
and moths to scoop them up and squeeze
through yard thick walls of stone
to re-pot the ladybird on a Hyacinth
bush and the scurrying spider
on a newel post by raised beds
of rhubarb and blueberries
but Genie lets slaters bide inside
a yard of stone to scurry
over oak and hide under knots.

Mandy Beattie, is a feminist from Caithness, Scotland with an MA in Social Work Practice & Research. Her poetry is a tapestry of stories and imagery, rooted in people, place and the natural environment, set at home and abroad.

 

On Flatulence, by Simon Williams


By Robert Garnham

On Flatulence

It’s commonly held that farts are methane.
While this is true for cows, sheep, goats
and other herbivores, it’s not for humans.
Our flatus (that’s the word, I looked it up)
is largely hydrogen, lighter than air.

So the story of the Persian Prince
with noteworthy and continuous flatulence,
who is supposed to have suffocated himself
while asleep on a low bed-pallet on a trip abroad,
could not have happened.

However, should an equerry have brought a lamp,
a naked flame into the chamber,
his highness, without rising from his sleep,
could have raised the roof.
I think that trumps the suffocation story.

 

Spring in Castletroy, by D’or Seifer


By Robert Garnham

Spring in Castletroy

The daffodils came up in time to call the receiving line of spring
begonias, pansies, allium have risen, heads abuzz,
guarded by sentries of Siberian Bugloss.

My droning throne circles,
delineating traces of shadowed green,
bladed bounds,
decapitated daisies and other weeds in its wake.

I perfume the public pathways
beyond my fence (across town lines)
with discarded cuttings.
Sure, they’re organic. They fall like rain
over the wall on the heads of the unsuspecting,
joining the emptied cans from men in trainers
re-filled with golden liquid, circumscribed with butts.

Maybe we’ll finally win Tidy Towns this year, if
Tommy Collins’ kids don’t express their creativity
in chalk on the pavement.

*Tidy Towns is an annual competition, in order to honour the tidiest and most attractive cities, towns and villages in the Republic of Ireland.

D’or Seifer contributes to poetry gatherings such as Filí an Tí Bháin and Over the Edge. She co-runs the online series Lime Square Poets. Her work has recently appeared in Skylight 47, The Galway Advertiser , and Lothlorien Poetry Journal.

 

King Edward VII, by Steve Harrison


By Robert Garnham

King Edward vii {1901-1910}

had to hang around a lot
as his mam was Queen Victoria who lived for ages.
I never met him but I knew his face
portrayed sideways on stamps and on old penny coins until 1971.

He went all over the world, not just on stamps
and being very rich, with loads of relatives in Europe ,
he could stay in his cousin’s palaces.
Running errands for Queen Victoria
some say he invented royal tours ,
the meet the people greet
and even Sunday Dinner.

Google his images and blimey that’s not fancy dress
but what he could wear with all his titles.
His Facebook friends page
a right royal impress.

If you live in an old house it could be Edwardian
built between 1901 to 1910 like lots of houses in cities.
The style in houses and trousers remained until later.

The present queen’s great grandad
though rumours abound who his other great grand kids may be;
and though it may sound like treason
the rumours have their reasons.
In his own day, as famous as jedward.
The seventh King Edward

Steve Harrison from Yorkshire now lives in Shropshire. His work has been published in The Emergency Poet collections, The Physic Garden, Pop Shot, Wetherspoons News, HCE, Strix, several on-line sites and appears on YouTube as steveharrisonpoet. He performs across the Midlands and The Marches and won the Ledbury Poetry Festival Slam in 2014.

 

Penny Dreadful, by Phil Binding


By Robert Garnham

Penny Dreadful – or The Terrible Tale of the Drive-By Poetry Murders of Old London Town

A cold wet dawn in the London fog,
an old man shuffled along with his dog
didn’t clock the limo with dark glass
whispering up from behind his arse.

The unseen driver yelled aloud
“I wandered lonely as a cloud,”
lobbed out a quill and sped away.
The shock of Wordsworth on a Walthamstow day

gave the old sod a seizure on the spot.
The only witness, a drunken old sot
bathed in vomit simply cried
“the daffodils, the daffodils!”, and died.

Officers exchanged significant looks.
“It’s another one”, they noted in their books
“Yus, he’s bin Wordswuffed alright.”
CID rocked up and security was tight.

A few days earlier, a little old bird
towing her shopping to the kerb
got buzzed by a flash motor, and heard
“…..let us go then you and I when the evening….”

In Doppler and missed the Routemaster Flyer
that crushed her beneath its Boris-funded tyres.
As she slipped into her own wasteland
she croaked to paramedics “It didn’t scan.”

The Daily Express pounced on the spate
of sonnet-soaked crimes, trumpeting hate,
“Catch the villanelle villains!!!” in red.
The Old Bill were baffled. “We’re baffled,” they said.

A senior Inspector gathered his cops
walls all plastered in digital shots
of grisly blood-spattered drive-by recitations
from Brixton High Street to Euston Station.

“You’ve had the briefing, now you know it
We’ve got a serial drive-by poet,
and he’s got to be vigorously sought.
We mustn’t rest til he’s eventually caught.”

“It’s the worst case I’ve ever met.
Oi is my cup of tea ready yet?
Gordon Bennett it’s a right old mess”
He adjusted his syrup to talk to the press.

“Just had reports of another one, guvnor.”
Some poor Nine Elms coster-monger
got Coleridged this morning, bad luck,
sadder and wiser, crushed by his sack-truck.

They raided the local poetry sessions,
poncey bards got nicked for possession
of venal volumes of popular verse,
others for criminal doggerel and worse.

Bethnal library had its shelves blocked
and records combed for lent-out stock
of Motion, Thomas, Plath and McGowan.
Open Mic evenings were brutally shut dowan.

Rumours abounded of writers rejected
underappreciated and dejected
who might consider revenge through crime
to be a creative use of their time.

Anyone caught with cravat or sandals
were stopped on the street like common vandals
entries to local competitions
were viewed with increasing and dire suspicion.

Then a breakthrough. After a hip-hop
attack of Keats in Kingston chip-shop
CCTV picked up the reg number in the night
“We’ve got im, guvnor. E’s bang to rights”.

The motor was registered miles from here
to a W Shakespeare in Warwickshire.
“Warwickshire?” What’s he doing here?”
And he hadn’t paid road tax for 400 years.

But hang about, result – it all stopped.
That couplet killer never got copped.
He faded into memory like William McGonagall.
No surprise – the enquiry turned up bugger-all.

In a quiet lane all covered in trees,
a burnt-out motor cooled in the breeze.
Nearby a discarded doublet and hose,
but who they belong to, nobody knows.

BIOG – Phil Binding
A poet and writer gently sliding into decrepitude in Burton and a member of The Lichfield Poets. I am all over Staffordshire like a rash at open-mikes and events despite friends begging me to stop. It’s already too late.