Weekly Muse

There's some trouble in the stubble

For a rabbit, with a stoat

And a scream across a cornfield

As incisors sink in throat

Then a shambles by the brambles

With a twitching in the straw

Where the fieldmice are frozen

In the stubble flecked with gore.

An elephant at Woburn Park

Looked frankly at his interviewer

"Well Melvyn," said the pachyderm,

"The openings are fewer

And painting in safari parks

Keeps elephants in Art today.

But still I find I'm better placed

Than are my feral cousins, say.

I dash these simple abstracts off

Which sell for fifty quid a go

The tourists seem to like them

And the Tate are hinting at a show

But though I feel my earlier work

Was grittier and more sincere

My dung won't win a Turner Prize

At least not for a second year."

Promoters suing Cornwall

For losses at eclipse?

May just as well sue bookies

For passing dodgy tips.

But how d'you sue a county?

Its clifftops, clouds and rocks?

Perhaps I could sue Essex

For Escorts and white socks.

Blame it on poor Tony Blair,

No sooner has he gone away

Than accusations fill the air

About his Tuscan holiday

And quite apart from all of this

The horsy set are in a bait

About the ragwort running wild

At Chequers, on the Bucks estate.

Now what do they expect of him,

Leave Cherie, kids and well-earned break

Roll up his sleeves on getting home

And set to work with scythe and rake?

"Drink laws should be more flexible."

Well, yes indeed, I quite agree.

It might well save my Easter speech

When foreign friends come out with me

It starts off with: "Look get that one down

I'll line two up with chasers then."

And ends up with: "Not Good Friday though,

That's like a Sunday. Half-past ten."

A street named after Billy Bragg?

in Dagenham? How very sweet.

Let others go where Essex leads

Now what about a Hawkwind St?

A stroll down Johnny Rotten Row

Or Bonehead Walk might be as pleasant

Passing Buzzcock Boulevard

To cut through Butthole Surfer Crescent,

A pint or two in Meatloaf Drive

As gently staggering home again

We trip along Syd Barrett Way

Collapsing in Keith Richards Lane