Starman

Hello…

Are you there?

Ground Control to Major Tom?

I… I hope you don’t mind me addressing you like this,
But it’s just that I feel I know you,
After that summer,
You know the one,
When we’d bought School’s Out and Aladdin Sane,
And blasted them out for the whole holiday
At my pal’s house
Because his mum was doing summer school
And didn’t seem to mind the catalogue of neighbour complaints
That were waiting for her each night.

And, ever since then,
I’ve had your voice in my head,
The Starman who watches over me,
My own personal Jean Genie.

And you taught me that it really was OK
To be the odd one out,
To be the only person in my year who didn’t like Slade,
And to have long hair and not wear a fucking Crombie.

And, hell, if you could be Ziggy and wear a dress
And still have girls chasing you,
Well,
Then there was hope for me
And I wouldn’t be a Diamond Dog
All my life.

And later you showed me I could wear suits
And still look kinda cool,
That I could say Let’s Dance
To girls that I liked
And, maybe, know a little
Modern Love.

And I’ve always turned to you when I’ve been
Under Pressure,
Or when I felt like Dancing In the Street.
And you gave yourself to my every bedsit room,
Well, at least your posters on my wall,
And I even bought your
Tin Machine CDs although everyone said they were crap,
Because being weird is really all about
Getting it wrong some times.

So, I’m going to miss you,
Ziggy Stardust.
And without your poems I’m going to
Be writing on the walls,
But now it’s time for Ashes to Ashes
And I hope it’s Hunky Dory wherever you are
With Andy Warhol
By your side
And that, by the time I get there,
Heaven will be a weirder place.

Because now you’ve gone and left me out on a limb,
No notice, no nothing,
Not even Five Years,
And though I keep hoping that it’s all a stunt,
And that you’ll swoop down onto the stage
Like Lazarus on a flywire
I’m scared that it’s really true and that you are really gone,
And that I’ll have to
Keep you alive by playing your old records
Like some sad old man,
Because I think the kids have killed a man
And it’s time to break up the band.
Can you hear me, Major Tom?

A Vampire’s Prayer for the Demise of Stephenie Meyer

Oh Stephenie Meyer
On your funeral pyre,
What have you done to the poor vampire?

You’ve capped his fangs,
You’ve staked his heart,
Cut off his head,
Oh, you think you’re smart.

You’ve dwarfed old Drac,
And his werewolf kin,
Oh, pity the day they invited you in.

But Stephenie Meyer
With your financial fire,
I really don’t care that your books are dire,

But by the ghosts of Lugosi,
Langella and Schreck,
We humbly curse
Your royalty cheque.

For you’ve left the vampire
Bankrupt and blutered,
And though Pattinson’s beautiful,
Nosferatu’s neutered.

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!

Poets’ Boyfriends

By popular request!

At first
She can’t find him in the gloom of their darkened room,
But she follows the snapping undergrowth of
Pizza boxes and crumpled beer cans to his chair,
The sonorous chant of football fans
Echoing
Like a throbbing descant of cicadas.

Good night, love?
His voice floats through the miasma.

The best, she begins, elated,
I’m slam champion of the world…

Oh, that’s good…
He says,
Not quite with her,
Oh, oh, oh, yes, yes, YES!
What a goal!

Sorry,
What were you saying, love?

Poets’ Girlfriends

You see them on the fringes of every gathering,
Bored witless and fortifying themselves with half pints of strong larger and endless packets of crisps.

Poets’ girlfriends.
Stoic. Uncomplaining.

Although, sometimes, in the confessional sanctuary of the ladies’ loo,
You might hear one of them whisper,
Well, it could be worse.
He could be into football, and then it would be all that hanging around on the sidelines in the freezing cold,
Pretending to watch him play.

Oh, life can be excruciating for a poet’s girlfriend,
Like,
When some intimate moment is broadcast to a roomful of strangers at the top of his stentorian voice,
Or that lovingly detailed description of the mole at the top of her thigh thundered out at forty decibels.

But poets’ girlfriends don’t falter.
They just sigh and smile and, drinking down their strong beer,
Try not to look bored or terse,
For they are here, and for the long haul,
They are poets’ girlfriends,
For better or verse.

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.

Cracking the Youth Market

I’m going to write a bestseller, for children agéd nine,
There’ll be wizards, orcs and Gollum-girls in this little book of mine,
My agent’s going to Hollywood to sign me up a deal,
They think I’m fat and female, it’s part of my appeal.

So I’m looking for a fag-hag who looks distinctly Goth,
She must be a size twenty-four with a tattoo of a moth,
I’ll prime her with my info and name her Gail Le Foys,
And send her off to LaLa Land to promote my books and toys.

And fan girls will all love me and send me sweets and jelly,
And all the geeks identify with the lady with the belly,
I’ll be the man behind the curtain, it’ll be my cross to bear,
While I watch the cash come rolling in, and, frankly, I won’t care!

The Social Network

This is the story of Alexis D’Bourne,
A girl quite addicted to internet porn,
She cared not for Facebook or My Space or Skype,
Or You Tube, Live Journal or networking hype.

She said to her girlfriends, although you may mock,
I’m a girl quite enamoured with internet cock,
I don’t care for email or family schism,
I just want to see blondies all covered in gism.

So send me hunk porn stars from Maine to Niagara,
A shipload of condoms and a case of Viagra,
A room with fast broadband to feed to my habit,
A packet of wet wipes and good rampant rabbit.

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Christmas Eve Spam

Upon a frosty Christmas Eve, I opened my email,
But it was bare as Hubbard’s press, and deader than a nail,
Where is my batch of daily spam, I did most loudly cry,
You have been here eleven months, now you decide to die?

How will I cope on Christmas day without my on-line betting,
My medicines from Canada, my properties for letting?
I’m lost without my lottery wins, my creams for parts turned spotty,
And without my blue Viagra jolt, I’m left all limp and floppy!

So come ye back, Nigeria men, and fill my email cache,
With mailing lists and fake degrees, for me to have a bash,
I love your offerings, one and all, they make me what I am,
And tomorrow won’t be Christmas day without some email spam.

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