The Flip Side & The Funny Side Read online

  After the conflagration

  Villagers came to stare

  At the grave of an ancient nation

  That nobody knew was there.

  In time they gathered the metal

  Strewn over Michael’s soil,

  Learned how to work and fettle

  For tool and girder and coil.

  And metal became a token,

  Contending came with the skill.

  Ambition and fear were woken.

  Their future awaits them still ...

  Forward to Index

  VISITING TIME

  I wandered, lonely as a cloud

  Of smoke outside a cancer ward

  Where cigarettes are not allowed,

  And wondered where the drugs were stored.

  Inside that safe? Behind this door?

  I’d never cased the joint before.

  I sauntered through the coffee shop,

  Down disinfected corridors,

  On past the sluices, man with mop

  (I wonder if he ever scores)

  Averted gaze from turning heads

  In rows of most un-private beds.

  At last I found the pharmacy.

  “Hallo my love!” the lady smiled.

  “Who is it that you’ve come to see?

  Your Mum? Your Dad? Another child?”

  Behind her, stacked on every shelf

  The stash I needed for myself -

  Barbiturates, and methadone,

  And other stuff that I could sell.

  (I couldn’t pull this job alone;

  I’d have to bring a mate as well.)

  I would impress her. I’m no fool!

  “I’m learning medicine at school.

  I’ve done the body, done the brain;

  I’ve started on prescribing now.

  I really need your help to train -

  Miss said the doctors would allow

  Me in your store to make a list

  So I can be a specialist.”

  I don’t know why she rang the bell

  Or why the docs and coppers came.

  My spiel was going really well

  Until she asked me for my name.

  At dawn they raided my old crowd...

  I wander lonely in my cloud.

  Forward to Index

  A LOVER’S PASSYONATTE REPLYE

  ( a metaphysickal sonet)

  Whereas two appels sittynge on a gait

  Do mounch eache othere, and do slyly mait,

  Do I oft wyshe thatt wee more often coulde;

  And synce wee cannot, I am verry wood.

  I looke upp att the Moone; shee ful wel knowes,

  Thy beauteous forme to mee shee sholde disclose,

  And I sholde drynke the honey of thyne eyen,

  And lie wyth thee, and mak thee wholly myne;

  But synce the dayes must Tortoys-lyk crawle bye,

  And nott lyk swyfte swallowës y-flye,

  Onn theyre harde bak moste paciount I must ryde,

  My wyngës clipt, my povre tong y-tyed;

  And wyth the swallowes sende my litel verse,

  And numbely wate for thee upon myne erse.

  Forward to Index

  EVER-DECREASING CIRCLES...

  Though I can be nobody else but me,

  If I were not myself, how would it be?...

  Myself would serve the soul of someone other -

  Not me - and I myself would rule another!

  Yet if I occupied this other I,

  I still would wonder how and where and why

  This other person lived who wasn’t me ...

  And so run on in circles endlessly!

  There is some consolation in the thought

  That someone somewhere equally is fraught

  With puzzlement - since he alone is he,

  Then how on earth can someone else be me???

  Forward to Index

  REDISCOVERING RABBIT WEEK

  Does he think?

  Too small to be real, bearing

  A marked resemblance to the trousered rabbit;

  Apparently knitted,

  The only clear distinction between him and the thing

  With which he holds communion

  Being

  The cap of golden fuzz over the ears

  And definitely fingers.

  Rabbit is an artifact, however.

  Verily knitted.

  Rabbit, flung, sprawls

  Uncomplaining.

  Rabbit chewed

  Is mercifully bloodless;

  Rabbit,

  Inspected and abused, deserves

  A medal for patience.

  As for the other

  Small cuniculomorph,

  Agent of these ritual indignities

  And muttered spells,

  There is more behind the

  Blue-bead eyes than bears question,

  Far more than old nylon stockings and foam chips,

  There is (and wonder at it)

  Sufficient

  Unto itself and still enough to spare

  Of magic mind

  Wherewith to gaze life into his woollen ally

  So I could swear

  The beast reciprocates the stare.

  - And does he think??

  Forward to Index

  Head of TV Drama’s New Year Sonnet

  To The Editor

  Radio Times

  80, Wood Lane

  London

  W12 0TT

  November 16th 1996

  I promise to announce the start

  At the beginning, and not part-

  Way through the hour’s dramatic art.

  I promise not to wreck the plot,

  Parading its climactic shot

  For weeks in every trailer slot.

  I promise not to fray the nerves

  Of those the Corporation serves

  By throwing fancy camera curves.

  I promise not to over-run,

  Delaying what should have begun,

  Spoiling the nation’s video fun;

  And promise - after the Star’s Wardrobe and Stunts -

  To credit the catchy theme music for once!

  (2017, 20+ years on, and nothing has changed.

  Surprise, surprise.)

  Forward to Index

  SARSAPARILLA

  My husband had to come to see

  How Pendle was - but minus me -

  And here acquired the pleasant habit

  Of sucking a Sarsaparilla Tablet.

  A friendly, enterprising chap,

  He dropped two packets in my lap

  On his return, and watched my face

  For signs of pleasure or grimace.

  To cut a happy story short,

  We soon were through the few he bought.

  It will be miles and months before

  We come back North and buy some more!

  So, could you post to us in Kent

  Enough to meet the cheque I’ve sent?...

  To last till Pendle calls again?

  Yours sincerely,

  Pamela Crane.

  Forward to Index

  PAINTWORK

  Cradled in the Mayor's Arms

  So many happy years,

  We knew our Dulux Weathershield

  (Affordable - we're not well-heeled!)

  Would last; but now the paint has peeled

  As the Millennium nears.

  It held the Hurricane at bay,

  It shimmered through the Drought,

  But lorries pounding through the night

  Shake wall and window, southern light

  Has bleached the blue and aged the white

  And cracks are opening out.

  Friends and strangers come to share

  A sanctuary here;

  Their welcome needs a shining door,

  Bright windows to the bedrooms four

  Whatever storms we have in store,

  To shelter and to
cheer!

  Forward to Index

  MANALYSIS

  Obsessed and upset by the inexplicable fact,

  We live - a yellow sun between two darknesses

  That shadow and touch it with something infinite there,

  An Always inescapable where something precious is;

  But hidden under Time.

  Oppressed and beset by the inner splitting of fact

  We give a narrow - unforeseen though hardness is -

  And shadowy muchness of nothing definite there,

  An all-ways inextricable and clumsy preciousness

  That isn't worth a dime.

  ( A bit of fun to rhyme!)

  Forward to Index

  SELF-SUFFICIENT

  Shouting between islands

  How Are You

  Signalling from peak to higher peak

  I Love You - whensoever the mist may clear -

  Shaking hands

  with a fellow briefly in a passing plane

  Able to speak

  to you

  on several wavebands

  Happy Birthday Dear

  Taking a turn as compère of the week

  I say again

  I wish you happiness in your sea-girt

  sanctuary

  wiping guano and turtle-dirt

  away from Beethoven and Vera Lynn

  with plenty

  of reasonably clean

  sand to bury

  your head in

  I hope you enjoy

  your cave

  No doubt you will employ

  a great deal of native ingenuity

  in making the most of such an opportunity

  to Save

  Have fun

  among the birds, up in the Seventh Heaven

  and give my regards

  to Angels Eleven

  You won’t fall down;

  the fuels you will need are only words

  and a front seat in the Sun -

  Hot Air

  will keep you there

  Safe out of real touch real sight real sound

  Tucked away in a high womb

  you deeply care

  for the lack of loving-room

  responsibly and gratefully aware

  of Us who wave and wonder from the ground

  with whom you share

  astounding

  Wisdom

  over the air

  We love you

  Yes we listen

  avidly to Number One for his Opinion

  amid the static …

  Bones wither away under the skin

  a soul begins to

  feel

  The cold and comes down out of the attic

  to make up on the missing

  Joie de Vivre Hot Pants Passion

  emphatic

  communiqués press handouts Lone Yachtsman kissing

  Miss Erotic Plastic

  Nineteen-thing

  fell flat

  we walk straight through

  you we never notice you we know you

  were never real

  Visiting gods are inconceivable

  and in Spring

  hermits are out of fashion

  Forward to Index

  ARMAGEDDON

  The day the moon fell

  Music screamed up a nerve in the world

  The robins crowed like cockerels

  And the wind blew all the air away

  The day the moon fell

  Ice cracked the face of the sun

  There were blue strawberries

  And a rampant worm bit a sparrow in half

  The day the moon fell

  Love and hate collided and blew up

  The last Pope ran for Parliament

  And God met the funny side of hell

  Forward to Index

  ROMANUS ROMANO

  O come to the shade

  Of the cool colonnade -

  Don't bother with vestimenta!

  What use is a tunic

  To Roman or Punic?

  This is the community centre!

  Vel Gallic, vel Grecian

  Your friend Diocletian

  Invites you to bathe at your leisure.

  It's such fun to swim in

  (As well as the women!)

  The scenery promises pleasure

  Diverting to play with;

  And you have a way with

  The ladies that seems to amuse them.

  So let's make a foursome.

  Ointment? I'd adore some!

  But never mind clothes - we don't use them.

  Forward to Index

  ON THE BRINK

  ... to breathe this element of muted sound

  and think only the things that fishes do ...!

  … I, squat on the parapet, look down.

  My mind, lapped in that weed-lucent brown

  Mapping the mossy under-arch with light

  hereunder shimmering ... lean over! Look!

  See? Touch it! (Not too far. Don't fall.

  Not yet.) Trickery, you see. The bright

  thing, like all wind-spun happiness, shook

  and left you to the darkness ... yea my mind

  moves to the slap and the sway of it.

  ... shall I be feeding the fishes, now?

  Or will the fishes give me

  to eat corals, rocksand, sunlight filtering,

  turtleshell, chilled fringes of moon;

  weed-broth from the crab's mouth

  and mud sifted in silver,

  seasoned with seed-pearls,

  served in a mussel-shell

  with a spoon?

  Come come, itty-bitty man!

  Come come! The fishes sing.

  One for Mummy,

  one for Daddy,

  eat your nice pudding!

  Ha! The blue waves. New and drinkable sky.

  Out there where the rainbow lives

  and soon shall I.

  The men who poison the rainbow

  poison the mind of me

  with an ill wind, and a sick rain,

  and they drive me to the sea;

  and the sun lies in a crooked way,

  and gods die as people pray,

  and fear spreads fungous through decay.

  But I shall soon be free ...

  ... soon in the sun-silk water I shall drop away,

  leaving my clothes behind, for there is blight on them.

  Soon I am ready. Are you coming with me?

  ... leaving your clothes behind, for there is blight on them.

  Why don't you take them off? Take off your clothes, I say!

  Your soul is rotting with it - I can see the mark,

  mark of a madman. Stay behind and save the world!

  I shall be under the bridges that you burn

  crowned with a crown of swimming sticklebacks

  to keep the twisted thorns out of my hair.

  Washed in the running radiance of pearls

  I'll have sweet skin, and I shall laugh! as stern

  Nemesis chokes you in your deadly air.

  Forward to Index

  Hiawatha & the Midges

  By the shores of Gichi Gumi

  Rising from the Big Sea Water

  See the cloud of tiny midges

  Hear them singing in the sunshine

  Happy to be free and flying

  Happy to be near the forest

  Near the tents and near the tipis

  Hear them singing to the horses

  Pawing in the summer forest

  See them settle on Nokomis

  Stitching hides and flapping wildly

  See them cover Minnehaha

  Running to the cooling water

  See them follow Hiawatha

  Running after Minnehaha

  Flying in their ears and noses

  Lodging in the braid and buckskin

  Up the skirt and in the breechcloth

  In the moccasins
and leggings

  Feasting on their legs and faces

  Then said mighty Hiawatha

  I will make a fire of pine wood

  Offer to the Great White Spirit

  To the great Gichi Manitou

  Many prayers and supplications

  Ask Him how to stop the itching

  How to send away the midges

  Then he rescued Minnehaha

  From the shining Big Sea Water

  Sent her off to look for firewood

  And he sent Nokomis with her

  Itching, scratching as they foraged

  Still pursued by hymning midges

  Then the mighty Hiawatha

  In the whining of the midges

  In the cries of Minnehaha

  Heard Gichi Manitou speaking

  Heard Him ask for many branches

  Set in heaps around the tipis

  Burning in a sacred circle

  Sending up their smoke to Heaven

  And he said to old Nokomis

  This will chase away the midges

  This will stop their biting, biting

  Their infuriating singing

  Go and make a paste of honey,

  Cedar, salt and burning garlic

  This will stop the bites from itching

  On your wrinkled face and fingers

  On my hero’s breast and belly

  Then with all the balm remaining

  I will massage Minnehaha

  As the smoke ascends to Heaven

  And she smiles in my embraces

  See the cloud of angry midges

  Rising from the tents and tipis

  Out of wampum bag and wigwam

  Rising angry through the forest

  In the smoke that bears them upward

  Smoke of sly Gichi Manitou

  Chasing from the sacred circle

  From the skin of Minnehaha

  From the skin of old Nokomis

  From the skin of Hiawatha

  From their cradle by the Water

  All the midges of the forest

  Then the sly Gichi Manitou

  Called upon great Animikii,

  Called the Thunderer to aid him

  Save His people from their torment

  For the Thunderbird is mighty

  Mightier than Hiawatha

  And his wings eclipse the Heavens

  And his winds are like a bellows

  Blowing life and death before him

  See him sweep the clouds of midges

  From the forest to the mountain

  From the mountain to the ocean

  From one ocean to another

  New and shining Big Sea Water