17.12.12

Of Private Parts and Corporal Punishment

Mrs General
abhorred children whose behaviour was feral,
Instructing them to live by her catechism:
"Papa, potatoes, poultry, prunes and prism."

4.12.12

Alice in Sunderland

Drax;
not a movie villain, so chillax.
A giga-maniacal wood-burning stove
plundering our Treasury's trove.

Written on learning that a coal-fueled power station is to be converted to burning wood to secure renewable energy subsidies from taxpayers...

30.11.12

25.11.12

It ain't cricket

American footballers;
Seemingly all big mothers!
Cause rugby fans a frown,
Strolling over a line, calling it a touchdown...

23.11.12

Boiling water

Angry brown water
Avon stirred from lethargy
by pier pressure

on seeing Bath's river in spate below Pulteney Bridge...

18.11.12

Miranda

Miranda Hart
Plays a big-boned, big-hearted part.
Wacky, funny, with talent imbued;
And always ready to appear semi-nude.

10.11.12

Eavesdropped

Man in the bar 
at the Star
droned on and on about his round
5.56, 7.62, 50cal; it wasn't profound

16.10.12

Live from Westminster, 1834


Mrs Wright was wrong
Black Rod's Box too hot to probe
Parliament burns

Today in 1834 the Houses of Parliament burnt, after the destruction by burning of Tallies (obsolete wooden record sticks) led to a flue fire in the House of Lords. The devastation was not complete but Westminster Hall is the only major surviving part that was incorporated into the current building designed by Barry and Pugin.

My world's a stage

Enter room stage right
Cross the limelighted planking
Exeunt stage left

or do you prefer

Enter room stage right
Cross the limelighted planking
Bow, exit stage left

15.10.12

The cold waters of Scapa Flow

World turned upside down
HMS Royal Oak sunk
while boys slept below

Written on the anniversary of the sinking of the Royal Sovereign class battleship HMS ROYAL OAK on the night of 13/14 October 1939.  Of the 833 sailors who died, 100 were boys, aged 15-17, an event that led to the Royal Navy ending the tradition of sending boys to sea for active service.

25.9.12

21.9.12

VOM KRIEG

FOX TWO! And GOTCHA!
Sea Harriers vee Sky Hawks
Young men play at war.

On walking Richard Gaul home after his stag do during the Falklands War...

19.9.12

A fishy business

Solitary stork
Taking his tithe from Lambrook
Grey-black mourning suit

Inspired by a heron (with too many syllables).  Is it the same bird as on 20 July 2012 and 18 June 2010?

31.8.12

28.8.12

Esteamed locomotion

The purr-wheep echoes
Across the valley's stillness
Steam locomotive

or do you prefer

Vapours billowing
In esteamed locomotion
We love a choo-choo

26.8.12

Pie Shop anecdote

Bradley Wiggins
Annoyed the French more than Mrs Miggins.
Riding off with the Tour de France
and cycling Gold, given half a chance.

20.8.12

Mike Oldfield

Mike Oldfield
Reeled when his tubular bells pealed.
Too long exposed at Glastonbury,
The one year it was so very sunny.

16.8.12

Miss Anastatia Rugg

Miss Anastatia Rugg,
In high dudgeon and thick fugg,
Sued for breach of promise the baker
Who Mrs Hawkins wouldn't make her.

25.7.12

What a good ol' boy, the IOC President...

Count Jacques Rogge
Belgium waffler, phlegmish cougher.
Having reached the Olympian heights,
Chose in the Olympic Village to spend his nights.

24.7.12

A Vatican Clerihew not a Limerick

There was a young lady called Joanna Cannon
Who yawned when the Pope preached on and on
She'd much rather be
with her dog Seth and robins one, two, three

Where have the skylarks gone?

Translucent blue sky
crowns Little Solsbury Hill
But no skylark sings.

22.7.12

Making a Dickens of a character...

Mr Pancks.
Steam blows; piston clanks.
Dickens of a character a metaphor did make;
A tugboat chugging in his Principal's wake...

18.7.12

9.7.12

Hotel dew lack

Moneyed stillness reigns
Royal Crescent drawing room
Outside it still rains


After walking for 30 minutes through that mist of precipitation that eventually penetrates to the bone, it was warm and dry in the hotel; a more agreeable way to await my sister-in-law, as she finished her training course. 

5.7.12

Thank you Late Heavy Bombardment

Matthias Willbold 
looked into craters on Earth so very old. 
Found our precious metals arrived as asteroids diving; 
Every debris cloud had a silver lining.

Inspired by this insight.


4.7.12

Haven't you got homes to go to?

The Great British Pub
Warm beer, sausage, egg and chips
Banter and Ranter


or do you prefer


The Great British Pub
Barman's cleavage from behind
Barmaid's from the front

1.7.12

Sick as a parody...

Wayne Rooney
Striker extraordinary
Falls on his back thinking of England, pet!
Hoofing his balls roughly towards the net

28.6.12

WMDs

A woman's Weapons
of Mass Distribution are
stiletto heeled shoes


inspired by this (posted on Twitter by @JoannaCannon)

26.6.12

Last of the Summer Pinta

Heartbroken tortoise
crawled his island end to end
Lonesome George has died


RIP the last of his sub-species of Chelonoidis Nigra on the Galapagos island of Pinta.

20.6.12

Mexican Stand-off

President Cristina Kirchner
moonlights as a mail deliverer.
"David Cameron, las Malvinas" crossed through;
"Try Falkland Islands" scrawled in blue.

14.6.12

29.5.12

The Return of the Nori

Dan Norris
learned nothing from Horace.
From MP to Mayor he's trimmed his aims;
Mr Norris Changes Trains.

20.5.12

19.5.12

Fantasy Fodder - Starters

Some loyal toast with 
brie and Frenchman's Kiss pâté
Fantasy Fodder.


Ideal for virtual parties on Twitter...

18.5.12

Music to shake the spheres...

Tectonic platelets
Requiem for an Angel
Stirs the heart's magma


or do you prefer


Tectonic platelets
Requiem for an Angel
Moves the heart's dark blood


On listening once more to Requiem for an Angel, by Paul Carr: the first time I've done so in a year.

16.5.12

Spring cleansing

Asma al-Assad,
your husband's bad.
If he loves you, surely he'll stop
draining Syria's blood, drop by drop?


A plea to the President's wife along the lines advocated by Sheila Lyall Grant and Huberta von Voss Wittig (the wives of the UK and BRD Ambassadors to the UN respectively, in yesterday's Times of London).

27.4.12

BSkyB's the limit

Jeremy Hunt
to be replaced by Tessa Munt?
Anything to avoid a rhyme scatological
in verse meant to be whimsical.

or do you prefer:


Jeremy Hunt
Poor Bloody Infantry grunt.
Kicked in the Trossochs
in the feud twixt Clans Camerons and Murdochs

26.4.12

Lovely weather for ducks

Es regnet viel zu viel
Schönes Wetter für Ente
Futter oder Sex?


Inspired by watching the ducks enjoying the Lam Brook where I live...

25.4.12

15.4.12

2:42 am

Low moon glimpsed through cloud
Strange repeated clanking noise
Owl hoots eerily

14.4.12

13.4.12

Just cause

Jack Straw
several dromedaries did bore
Droning on so, justifying war in Iraq
The last camel might've broke Straw's back

12.4.12

Lucky Seven Meme Game

Nettie Thomson has kindly tagged me as one of the seven writers to next participate in the Twitter game, the Lucky Seven Meme game.


This requires the tagged writer to 
  1. Select page seven or 77 of the writer's current manuscript;
  2. Find line seven;
  3. Post the next seven lines or sentences, exactly as they are (no cheating)
  4. Tag seven other writers to do the same.
  5. Let those writers know...
It's an honour I don't think I deserve, not yet having published a novel. My WIP, Exiles, is at an early stage. It's merely a collection of scenes, with many gaps between them, so it's difficult to identify even page seven let alone page 77 at the moment. Therefore I've chosen the seventh file, counted seven lines down, and plucked the following seven lines from it:
The Conclave had but a single purpose, the review of the known exoplanets and their star systems. The People were searching for a second home. The futures of up to 25,000 Persons would depend on the suitability of the chosen target system. It was a complex decision, dependent on many factors – the characteristics of the star; the known planets, the distribution of dust, gas and planetoids, if any were detected; the distance from the Solar System and quantitative analyses of both the scientific uncertainties and concomitant risks in choosing the first extra-solar home for humankind.
As it's first draft, and the work is evolving as I write, I'm not even sure it will survive the second draft re-write, but there you go... Mission accomplished.


Finally, to fulfil my obligations to whoever started this game, I would like to tag the following seven authors (with apologies if they have already been so tagged - does that excuse them, I wonder?). 


The Magnificent Seven are:


@rebeleith


@bobosvensk


@sarahduncan1


@mariwriter


@marikacobbold


@yabunonaka


@russwrites







Bladud's Head Thoughts (4)

Bladud's Head beer stop
Edge of Bath - sows rooting up
and bores mouthing off


or do you prefer:


Bladud's Head beer stop
Bath's edge; sows rooting before
Bores spouting behind

8.4.12

6.4.12

A slower era...

Too much luxury
Time to watch lock's slow decline
Faster out than in

inspired by these moments...

5.4.12

Route canal work

Waiting for dentist
Watch canal lock in stasis
Water slowly drops


inspired by these moments...

21.3.12

19.3.12

The luck of the Irish...

...sadly deserted them on their Saint's day rugby union match against the mighty English:

Stumbles and fumbles
St Patrick's luck deserts greens
for the red dragons

18.3.12

St Patty's Day Poetry Challenge

A would-be writer from Wales
took time off from his travails
to compose in lieu
a poor Clerihew
that against a Haiku sadly pales:


Rachelle Gardner
"Howdy, pardner!
Write me a verse most slick,
a three line seventeen syllable Limerick."


written in response to this challenge.

14.3.12

Getting it into perspective



Immortal wand'rers
Venus conjuncted with Jove
But no bull this time

inspired by this astronomical accident of celestial geometry and perspective...

12.3.12

On viewing CORIOLANUS, The Movie...

Caius Martius Coriolanus 
by the Bard made famous. 
"...husband to a murdered wife  ...father to a murdered son; 
er..., no, that was the other one. 

5.3.12

Three Wanderers

Orange Mars rising
Evening star sets with Jove
Three planets in view


Sadly, I missed the bolide that transited north to south about 20 minutes after I viewed these planets while walking to the pub...

29.2.12

Twixt two worlds

Skeletal forms bridge
Severn's wide roiling waters
Five worlds conjuncted




On seeing the crescent Moon, Venus and Jupiter in loose conjunction over the Severn Crossings linking England and Wales last Sunday evening.

23.2.12

The Cardinal Sin

The Cardinal Sin said
it's not how many angels dance on a pinhead,
it's envying their Strictly win,
that's the Cardinal Sin.