COMPETITION

What'll Be the Title?

Jaspistos

IN Competition No. 1493 you were asked for a poem inspired by Justin Richardson's one with the above title. By kind permission of Punch, I reproduce it here in all its dental and labial glory: 0 to scuttle from the battle and to settle on an atoll far from brutal mortal neath a wattle portal!

To keep little mottled cattle and to whittle down one's chattels and not hurtle after brittle yellow metal!

To listen, non-committal, to the anecdotal local tittle-tattle on a settle round the kettle, Never startled by a rattle more than betel-nuts a-prattle or the myrtle-petals' subtle throttled chortle!

But I'll bet that what'll happen if you footle round an atoll is you'll get in rotten fettle living totally on turtle, nettles, cuttle-fish or beetles, victuals fatal to the natal élan-vital, And hit the bottle.

I guess I'd settle For somewhere ethical and practical like Bootle. It was strange to discover in such a mechanical, tongue-twisting exercise a few touches of authentic emotion. James Teb-

butt had me reaching for my handkerchief with: Oh, Linda, so tender of touch yet no kinder than thunder. . .

Being no Pindar or Spender, To render your wonder I flounder.

So did Peter Wigmore's bitch Ca romper and a jumper), who 'died in Kuala Lumpur/with distemper and a whimper'.

Monica G. Ribon and Frank McDonald and E.O. Parrott did well, but the winners' space available goes to three, who take £20 each, and David Heaton, who drops a fiver for assuming that brevity is always the soul of wit. Courage, mes vieux, there is yet more booze on the horizon.

Leaver-bovver

It's over for ever! I'll rush to the river, or take a Rail Saver to Dover, or Suva or possibly Java (those might need a Rover).

A raver in fever, I shiver and haver, I quiver and quaver, my sickness grows graver, I scream like a plover, gnash teeth like a beaver. No longer I'll waver — I'll just grab a cleaver and slice the deceiver; I'll do it with fervour!

But will that recover a summer of clover (the savour, the flavour!), a false lover's favour, or comfort the carver?

Be braver, poor griever; hard work's an im- prover. Don't be a sigh-heaver or act like a diva; cry, 'Viva the hoover!'

(Grani de Morgan) I could have been Lord Dacre or a balalaika- maker, A docker or a vicar or a pickled-pepper-picker, A shorter Peter Walker or a meeker Kenneth Baker Or a lucre-laden Laker or an even slicker Whicker. . . .

I could have been a hookah-smoker hunkering in Mecca, A liquor-wrecked old busker or a biker or a trucker, A darker Charlie Parker or a sleeker Chubby Checker, A stoker or a broker or a gee-gee-backing sucker . . .

I could have been a soccer striker hooked on beta-blockers, A double-decker-wrecker or a knicker-dropping hooker, A knocker-back of hock or one of oakier Riojas . .

But I'm only Jeffrey Archer and I'll never win the Booker! (Peter Norman) Bring my bridle and my saddle! Set these aged knees astraddle, while you twiddle with the girdle round the middle, And astride a lanky steed I'll join the huddle and the muddle to enact once more this model feudal idyll.

And the maid'll bring a caudle in a deep spheroidal ladle, and the stirrup-cup will sizzle on the griddle, While the colonel all befuddled will attempt to grab a cuddle as they paddle in the grey colloidal piddle.

And I'll wish I'd never meddled with this idle fiddle-faddle: it's a riddle why I'm such an addled noodle.

I deserve a bloody medal for this Barmecidal ordeal, but I wish it all in Hell — the whole caboodle. (Noel Petty) If you want to dilly-dally, Don't dully watch the telly with your jolly smelly collie — Don't be a silly wally!

Walk your Millie or your Molly, with her frilly little brolly; Find a gully in a valley; do not sully her new woolly, But golly! just get pally and enjoy some folly fully — And mind the bally holly! (David Heaton)