The Tragic Passing of Undead Augustus

There once lived a boy called Augustus Fred,

Who wouldn’t get up and just lay in his bed,

He slept all day and slept all night,

A disgrace to his father, to his mother a blight.

 

One day they decided to open his curtains,

The sun would surely him out for a Burton,

But Augustus had nailed them tightly shut tight,

So the light in his room was always night.

 

So they opened the door and wheeled out his bed,

And though he lay dormant as if he was dead,

They pushed his bed to the sun so bright,

Said, look my son, this is daylight.

But he just went all a-quiver and turned to ash,

And Mum said, Blimey, we’ve settled his hash!

Animal Crackers

I was a “take-away poet” at Portobello Library (Edinburgh) yesterday, where people would come up to me and ask me to write a poem for them. There were all sorts of requests, but my favourite was a little girl called Iona who wanted a poem about small cute animals, leopard cubs in particular!

The animals were talking in the jungle one day,
There were tigers and leopards and a cheetah called Ray,
When Mister Len Leopard, announced to the group,
That his good wife was cooking some antelope soup.

And the tigers and wolf-cubs and lions and bears,
Went round to the Leopards’ and sat down in chairs,
And good Mrs Leopard served up bowls of stew,
With side orders of salad and antelope goo!

But at the top of the table sat a cub called Iona,
A cute spotted leopard cub, I’m sure that you know her,
She ate soup with her parents and said, this is good,
I’ll have second helpings, I think that I should.

So she ate and she ate, she had elephant cake,
Green octopus salad and mockingbird bake,
Salt-battered conger eel tart and walrus bratwurst,
But just before pudding, Iona, she burst!

Flyering The Mile

This one’s for everyone out there trying to snare audiences for their Fringe shows in Edinburgh

I went out to the Royal Mile to distribute some flyers,
I didn’t need a license, “O” Levels, even Highers,
I just took my neck of shiny brass, and my resolve of tempered steel,
And asked the people that I met to share my showman’s zeal.

Oh, come and see my little show, I begged, cajoled, I pleaded,
I have the script, I have the hall, an audience is what’s needed,
But they looked at me and laughed aloud, begone, they said to me,
We want to go see famous men, we have no time for thee.

And so I felt another scheme I surely should anoint,
And now I bring my audience in in handcuffs at gunpoint.

PYGMALIONATION

The artist stood on tippy-dippy toes, preening at his masterpiece. “I have not achieved such lifelike tones before,” he drooled, “and such colours, spectrum hues and more.”

“Then why not take a dip inside,” the naked lady invited, “you’ll like me better in the flesh, you’ll go not unrequited.”

He looked around then stepped inside, wincing as he felt the acid burn of his blood turning to turpentine. “It’s not what I expected when I stepped into your nation,” he gasped.

“Ah,” said the lady, “it’s not all pleasure, this exploration.”

The Death of Eric

This is the story of Eric de Vine,
A boy would only answer in rhyme,
It drove his mum scatty, it drove his dad mad,
And his Gran, she did say, You’re for it, me lad.

You’re going to your auntie who lives in Glen Carse,
With a flea in your ear and a boot up your arse.
So he arrived with his suitcase, his Aunt said, hello,
But Eric replied, fuck you, you old hoe.

So the Aunt said to Eric, oh dear, you’re a mess,
We’ll see how you fare in the wilds of Loch Ness,
And on the dead stroke of midnight he was thrown on the shore,
But he just lit a fire, said, this is a bore.

When a monster reared up its slimy old head,
Said, I’ll just eat this lad and then go to bed,
And he roared and he roared like a scalded old maid,
But Eric he said, oh, I’m really afraid.

And he roarèd right back, he had it verbatim,
Which pissed off the monster, who quite promptly ate him.

A Happy Event

This is the story of the Forsythe-Browns,
There are many people like them in all old England’s towns,
And they were waiting for the stork on a cold winter’s night,
But the bundle that he left them did cause them quite a fright.

For lying in the crib, where a baby, he should be,
Was a purple Egg-a-noggin-nog who gurgled out, Mummy,
Mum telephoned the doctor and she telephoned the stork,
But they both said that’s the parcel for Acacia Avenue, York.

But this is not a baby, said a frantic Mrs B,
He’s had tadpoles for his breakfast and banana-skins for tea,
And now his father’s taken him on the purple evening tide,
To catch a lonely crocodile that’s forty inches wide.

Just then the babe and father came and sat down in the lounge,
And hubby said, what ho, my dear, are there biscuits we can scrounge?
That thing is not my son, she cried, which wasn’t very nice,
But the egg-a-nog, it ate them both, and never did think twice.

So all you mums and dads out there, pray listen to my song,
Just love what you are given and you’ll never go far wrong.

To A Mousse

Wee sleekit coorin’ timorous dessert,

Topped with cherries and a fresh cream squirt,

I see you tremble with anticipation,

As my spoon comes close to your sugar nation.

 

Oh, if ever a pudding could be blessed with legs,

Your fragile self but the whites of eggs,

And you cannot run as my spoon descends,

A lick, a lip-smack, and your life ends.

 

It is no longer a world of mousse and man,

But of empty bowl and whipped cream can,

So, pudding, reflect on the vagaries of fate,

While I lick my spoon and clean my plate.

Nursery Crimes

Georgie Porgy, pudding and pie.
Felt so bad he wanted to die,
When a voice on the telephone said, My my,
Have you been mis-sold any PPI?

Twanking on Twitter

Oh me name is Aloysius Motorola Fred McSkitter,
And I wears me dirty raincoat when I’m twanking off on Twitter,
I send my Tweets to blondie girls to read on their i-Phone,
And all the while I’m sitting here a-polishing my bone.

I’m the scourge of cyber dating, an instrument of scorn,
You call it social network, I call it network porn,
So lock up all your daughters, here comes the Twitter Twanker,
And I do it all from RBS where I’m a merchant banker.

The Love Song of Edgar Allen Poe

Let us go then, you and I,
To the Tomb of Ligeia, bye and bye,
Let us go to the Kingdom by the Sea,
The fish and chip shop of Annabelle Lee.
Let us go to the costal laundrette run by Lenore,
Let us throw open the windows and the door,
Dispel the gloom and evict the black cat,
Make a monkey of the ape asleep upon the mat.
Let us drink a draught of Hemlock at the House of Usher,
Where the décor is like the unquiet tomb, only plusher,
Let us imbibe at the Tell Tale Heart,
Let the parrots sing and the ravens play their part.
Alas, alas, M. Valdemar has come and I am at the door,
And I hear a melancholy chorus of black birds crying, Nevermore.