Toby’s New Boat

When Toby’s best friend Algernon
bought himself a boat
Toby had to buy one too –
just one that didn’t float.
While Algernon’s was made of wood
and radio controlled
Toby’s was an Airfix kit
one too big to hold.
While Algernon played on the lake
and then fell in and drowned,
Toby’s boat was in the bath –
remote control he’d found.

Harry the Law

There was a point in Harry’s life
with two choices like a fork in the road
One to be normal, grow up, get a wife,
or the other, where his seed remained unsowed.

Contrary to his crowd of peers,
Harry chose the thinner of the trails
and despite his mother’s never-ending fears
steered his way through life as if on rails.

“I want to be a lawyer,” Harry said,
“and make my money winning every case”
and to that end he studied hard and read
the documents that paved the legal race.

His studies culminated in his digs
with pentagram and tallow candles fine,
when summoned demons brought him powdered wigs
and trained him to plead Devil v. Divine.

Lady of Leisure

Gary Arnold met a girl
a lady of the night
he offered her a wad of cash
to set his loins alight.

He led her to his parent’s house
and sneaked her up the stair,
excited by the prospect of
a lady’s underwear.

“What kind of girl you take me for?”
she said with nasal whine
“before you try to bed a girl
invite her first to dine.”

“Of course,” said he with blushing cheek
what would you like to eat?”
“You,” she said, “I’ll star with head
and finish at the feet.”

And despite Gary’s sudden rush
of groin-inducing measure,
she shed her skin and ate him up:
A monster’s plate of pleasure.

A Momentary Kindness

“I can see the stars,” she said, a smile upon her face.
The man above her frowned and touched her hand. He said: “This place
has neither sun nor moon nor sky to see the stars
but just a ceiling painted with Olympia and Mars.
But I will not deny your dreams if dreams will give you sights
of all you find that’s pleasing in the darkness and the lights.
In the sky are wonders, if your inner soul be true
but I am just a humble man so what am I to do
but tell you lady fair, that I have loved you from afar
and if you find that pleasing, I will catch your guiding star.
In velvet I shall wrap it and in leather I shall sew
a pouch to keep the star with you wherever you will go,
where’er the path will take you, be it Heaven or to Hell.”
And then she closed her shining eyes. The guillotine blade fell.

The Accidental Marriage...

The Accidental Marriage, and Deliberate Damnation, of Anthony Fletcher

Anthony Fletcher
in a mockery of sudden misunderstandings
signed his name on the wrong line
and found himself
not an usher, but a groom.

His new wife Jane,
ten years his elder yet a teenager herself,
said “I’m not marrying your spotty brother!”
which was unfair
because Anthony washed with Germaway soap
and petroleum
and only had a few spots
on his chin.

“Well,” he said,
“I don’t want to be married
to my smelly brother’s stinky girlfriend”
Which was also unfair
because Jane had washed last month.

“Now now,”
said the vicar,
“I have a solution,”
and he excommunicated
young Anthony.

The world went a peculiar shade of grey.
His marriage dissolved.
His Catholicism unconfirmed.
His baptism voided.

“What happened?” he said
but nobody heard him.
He tried shouting.
“Was that the wind?” somebody said.
He screamed.
“I can hear the trees,” said somebody else.
He cursed God
a man appeared
in a white cotton jacket
and herringbone slacks
and two tiny horns.

“Hello Anthony,” he said
“Shall we be friends?”
And he took Anthony’s hand
and bought ice-creams
from the van across the road from the church.

Feline Tanka

Sometimes, a cat needs
undivided attention
but once in a while,
after a hard day’s napping,
they need a really good sleep.