Normal Norman - Clerihew Plus

Good old Norman,

Thank goodness he’s normal.

Unlike many a friend,

He hasn’t gone round the bend.

Stevens is his surname:

He never plays the Blame Game.

Such a decent chap

And never utters rubbish.

Whoops, I had to miss that rhyme,

To avoid committing a bit of a crime.

Norm is quite the hero,

And something of a Shakespearo.

He’s maybe my biggest fan,

From England to Japan.

Reading poems from me,

Right there on his Smart TV.

So Norman enjoy your beer,

As I will always be here.

Paul Butters

© PB 1\12\2018.

School

Who put the “sub” into “subversion” and “subculture”?

Was it the same people

Who built schools:

Those prisons

Where kids are tortured

And brainwashed

Into being “good” conforming citizens –

Factory fodder

Trained to sit in lines

Labouring at meaningless tasks,

Questioning nothing?

So still we are ruled

By Tory Grandees and Brussels Bureaucrats

Keeping us in our place:

Social Control
Over Job Centre slaves.

It’s the same the whole world over:

The rich wallowing in luxury

While the poor starve to death

Exposed to pitiless winds.

For once words fail me

About our Unfair World.

Children dying everywhere

While fatcats feed in a frenzy.

No wonder people talk of Revolution

And terrorist plots.

Our air is full of carbon

While trees are cut

Down

For seas of palm oil.

We need to reconsider

What we do

In all our ways.

Enough is enough.

It’s time to nurture nature

As denizens of Planet Earth.

Paul Butters

© PB 23\11\2018.

Stalemate

Remoaners to the left, Brextremists to the right,

Theresa “Maggie” May has an uphill fight.

I can’t see her lasting many more days,

Unless she changes her stubborn ways.

Theresa is an immovable object.

Her hubby must be totally henpecked.

Trying to please just everyone,

Annoying all is what she’s done.

Right now she is UK Prime Minister,

But her own back benchers are getting sinister.

Some say she’s sold us down the river,

A thing for which they can’t forgive her.

Others claim she’s gone too far,

As we should stay just where we are.

Some see Europe as our friend,

But others say the UK we must defend.

Ireland is a sticking point

A thing that’s gonna rock the joint.

They don’t know where to put the border,

Without causing grief and disorder.

What an impasse, feels like stalemate,

Are we heading to be a slave state?

Who knows what’s going to happen next?

No wonder we are all perplexed.

Paul Butters

© PB 17\11\2018.

 PS the word "Brextremist" was used in The Commons this week by Labour MP Angela Eagle so I "borrowed" it.

Words

Armies of words gather in my head

To march so boldly onto the page.

They work their wonders

Who knows how?

Why they pick me as their channel

For their landing craft

I’ll never know.

Some accident of birth:

Genetic fluke –

For which I take no credit –

Makes me nectar to these ants

That line themselves into verse.

Compulsion drives me to write

As salmon must jump those water falls

To return to their spawning grounds.

I have to speak, or rather type:

Express myself

No matter what,

Whether good or bad.

Is there a cure for this affliction of mine?

Can I ever stop myself from writing?

I very much doubt it.

Paul Butters

© PB 16\11\2018.

Bonfire Night

(Picture Credit - Sky News)

Back in the day,

When I was a little whipper snapper in Leeds,

We would go “chumping”, as we called it, for firewood,

For weeks and weeks.

Everyone built towering infernos,

Ready for November Fifth:

Bonfire Night.

Some made effigies of the “evil” Guy Fawkes,

Leader of the “Gunpowder Plot”

And stood in the street saying

“Penny for the Guy”.

What a night!

Roaring fire on a chill Winter night,

Those flames burning your face.

A World War Three

Of Fireworks:

Rockets, Catherine Wheels and bangers.

Bangers to scare the girls.

Kids painting pictures in the air

With sparklers.

And best of all,

That yummy gingery Parkin cake:

A taste I cannot put

Into words.

Oh and deep dark

Treacle Toffee,

Jacket potatoes

And Crunchie-like cinder toffee.

It’s many a year since I went to a bonfire.

Politically correct firework displays

Are more the modern thing.

Seems strange to burn the effigy

Of a man who had the sense

To try to blow parliament up –

Especially a Yorkshire Man.

Ha ha.

But then I read that good

Religious reasons are behind

This bonfire Celebration:

Those flames are orange

After all.

Not wishing to create divisions

Anywhere in the world,

It’s still good to see traditions

Being maintained.

Let those fires and fireworks keep rising,

Constantly emerging from the shadows

Of Halloween.

Paul Butters

© PB 27\10\2018. Written at the request of Stephen Chapman. “Treacle toffee” added later, with “jacket potatoes” and “cinder toffee” added on 31\10\18. "Roast chestnuts" added 18\11 and this poem copied to the "Planet Paul" blog.