COMPETITION

Revised version

Jaspistos

In Competition No. 1390 you were in- vited to expand and retell a nursery rhyme in your own poetic manner, supplying a surprise untraditional ending.

When I said 'retell' I meant 'stick rough- ly to the same story', but some of you left the original so far behind that it was lost in the swirling mists of fantasy. I was thinking of those splendid Chesterton retellings of 'Old King Cole' in the manner of Whit- man, Tennyson, Yeats et al. Anyway, it was a richly, not to say ripely, imaginative entry. Jean Hayes turned 'Polly, Put the Kettle On' into a skiving workers' tea song, Charles Mosley had Mary's Falkland Is- land lamb knocked off by an Argentinian gun, Denis Clark, in a neat role reversal, featured the farmer's wife being chased by 'an eyeless trinity of mice', and Grob Smith produced a fine, grotesque opening:

Oranges and lemons, say the bells of St Cle- ment's, Are scavenged by tramps with delirium tre- mens . . .

The winners, hard to separate from fast-running Peter Hadley, Frances Rhodes, E.L. Bellwringle and Joyce John- son, earn £8 apiece, and the bonus bottle of Veuve Clicquot Gold Label 1979 Vin- tage Champagne (the gift of NERA) is taken by the artful rhymester, Ron Rubin. There was a young girl called Miss Muffet Who sat down one day on a tuffet. (She'd sooner have had A chair; I might add, But sometimes you just have to rough it.) She was scoffing her curds and her whey When a spider came up and said, 'Hey! I know this sounds hackneyed, But I'm an arachnid Alone — may I lunch with you, pray?'

As she shrugged and made room on her tuffet, He whooped, 'You're my lunch, dear Miss Mullet!'

Then the monstrous tarantula Began to dismantle her, And that's how Miss M. came to snuff it.

(Ron Rubin) Yes. He remembers Adlestrop Because one rainy afternoon The 2.30 to Gloucester stopped there Suddenly. It was running soon.

Startled, he flung open the door. No one else did. The medico-legal chap Alone leapt to the bare platform. No voice warned, 'Mind the Gap'. He fell waist-deep into a puddle And mind-deep into litigation.

Dripping wet, he phoned his solicitor Immediately from Adlestrop Station.

Well — he knew the form, didn't he?

He sued. And now Doctor Foster Is richer than all Harley Street - Only for thinking Adlestrop was Gloucester! (D.B.Jenkinson) Musing alone, there falls upon my ear Sound of a fiddle playing in the street. The night is still, the tune is far from clear And yet — and yet the melody is sweet.

Peering, I see the moon begin to rise And throw some pallid light upon the scene, Bringing to view before my startled eyes A feline music-maker, long and lean.

Then, as the moonbeams slowly onward creep, A distant cow braces itself to spring And clears the moon in one gigantic leap. Some canine laughter now begins to ring; A tiny, doggy voice cries, 'Oh what fun!' The entertainment's over all too soon. Now my beloved's busy day is done; Dishy she is and we begin to spoon.

(M.Moore) Mary, Mary, tell me, pray, How does your garden grow? It flourishes, I'm glad to say And makes a lovely show. But look, your garden's full of weeds; Are you insane – or what? Why no, to satisfy my needs, I've let it go to pot. (Roger Woddis) The mouse was cornered on the hallway floor. The mouse had never felt so weak and small. It heard an urgent rapping at the door, And then it saw the clock against the wall.

There was no time for reason or for thought. The mouse knew action was its only chance. A mouse who hesitates is always caught. It made the leap without a second glance.

It clung like fury to the varnished wood, Its tiny claws embedded in the frame, And then, just when the going seemed so good, The clock struck thirteen and the Thought Police came.

(Basil Ransome-Davies) Young Mary, daughter of a country farm, Rescued an orphan lamb from winter's blight, And sedulously shielded it from harm Until the spring. The lamb, which was pure white, Grew so attached to Mary's kindly way That it would never leave her. Thus it passed That when poor Mary went to school one day Her lamb came too. The teacher was aghast. `Remove that animal at once,' he blazed. The student council ruled within the hour That consultation issues had been raised, And rights for animals, and pupil power. The school was closed, the flying pickets flew, And stand there yet, since neither side con- ceded.

The lamb, by now a rather portly ewe, Crops calmly on the hockey field, unheeded.

(Noel Petty)