HENDECASYLLABIC LXI

This is a Japanese style of verse with 11 syllables to each line
and 19 lines in each poem - hence the 3 odd lines in the middle.


The Japanese are a well disciplined race

And that is reflected in their poetry.

They must county syllables when the muse descends

They are not permitted verses wild and free.

I think their Haikus are the most restrictive

But perhaps they enjoy a challenge and find

Satisfaction in such a difficult task -

And a rigid structure concentrates the mind.

   A poem without rhyme isn't poetry -
   Of course I cannot speak for the Japanese
   And some modern poets might well disagree.

Into every other multi-syllabled line

I introduce a different dimension

I go for an ABCB rhyming scheme

It's much easier than some I could mention.

The Japanese verse sceme is rigid and has

Syllables of seventeen, five or seven.

If Hendecasyllabics were natural

We'd have had not ten fingers, but eleven.


June 2006

AM I OLD? LX

                                                              LX

Old age comes on gradually -
So I have been told
And it is the attitude of the young
That reminds you that you're old.

They speak slowly and clearly,
In a gentle kindly way
To make sure you understand
Everything they say.

"How are we today?" they ask
In a sweet and dulcet tone.
I think they are well within
The patronising zone.

"Well done" says the girl encouragingly
As |I get out of the dentist's chair.
I yearn to respond sharply - but
She means well so I forbear.

A woman in her sixties
Seems an ancient OAP
When you are fit and young -
And not much more than twenty.

I knew that I was old last week -
Mags. for young women seemed obscene
And I found myself picking up
A Saga magazine.


March 2007

A NEW WORRY

                                                         
                                                          LIX

The media like to frighten us
On a wide subject range:
Snowball earth - Greenhouse earth -
Global warming - climate change.

The more they try to scare us
The more blase we become
So another worry must be found
To which we might succumb.

They've now come up with something else
To make our lives more fraught:
A coronal mass ejection -
A CME for short.

Billions of tons of plasma
Thrown off by the sun
Could wreck our power stations -
Every single one.

The more advanced the country -
The more sophisticated the technology
The more destructive and devastating
A solar storm would be.

If a flare should strike us
How many cities would survive
Sans computers - internet - communications?
Only primitive societies would thrive.

Is there a silver lining
To this power-cut cloud?
Well, the Milky Way will be brilliant
And the Aurorae more colourfully endowed.

April 2009

EVEN DOCTOR SPOCK GOT IT WRONG

                                               LVIII

Bringing up children is not easy
You are certain to do something wrong.
You're either too strict or too lenient,
To the P.M.  Club very few belong

(P.M. - Perfect Mother )

If you smack a child when he's naughty
You can damage his psyche for ever.
Patient explanation is what you need,
But violence - no never, never.

If he turns out wild and unruly
His mother must be to blame.
Did you give enough love and affection?
You shouted?  Tch.  Tch.  What a shame.

And it really is no valid excuse
To say you did as you were told.
You must have done something wrong somewhere
Did you smack?  Did you nag?  Did you scold?

I'm glad I did not read a Spock book
Until it was far too late.
My children are sensible adults
And I certainly made many a mistake.

To J and C

(before smacking one's child became a criminal offence)

WORLD'S WORST WINDOW CLEANER

                                                                    LVIII

They say window glass is not porous
But the experts are wrong once again,
As I prove every single time
I clean a window pane.

I wash and shine the outside
And get it gleaming clean
Then I go back indoors
And repeat the whole routine.

But as I rub and polish
I notice with surprise
That a greasy patch has moved outside
Before my very eyes.

So out I go with my "shammy"
To wipe the window pane,
But the smear has seen me coming
And gone inside again.

I do not give up easily
And pursue that errant smudge
In and out - and out and in
As through the house I trudge.

Then the glass plays its trump card.
Yes, I know it's hard to believe,
It holds the smear within it
'Till I think I've won - and leave

As |I sip a well-earned coffee,
I can't believe my eyes:
A blurry, smudgy mark appears -
It spreads and multiplies.

I will get my own back,
I'll ignore it - look the other way,
Then suddenly pounce and wipe it off -
But some other day.

Now when, in the dim and distant future
Someone with a very high degree
Discovers this phenomenon in window glass
Will anybody ever think of me?

To me.
September 1990