No. 1353: The winners

Jaspistos reports: Competitors were asked for a light-hearted love poem with the metre and rhyme-scheme of one of the choruses in Swinburne's Atalanta in Calydon. I thought the metre and rhyme-scheme were easily graspable, but a surprising number of you made the stanza into six lines or rhymed amiss. Basil Ransome- Davies began with sultry splendour:

Dear, my ardour for you Is as fierce as the heat Of a mulligan stew Or the infantry's feet.

You have hurtled my temperature upwards; you have peppered with chilli my meat.

And Mary Ann Moore ended equally well:

If a toothless embrace Should attract you at all, And if love-in-a-mist Gives your shadow a call, Relax, like a wasp on a peach, as you relish the fruits of the Fall.

Ten pounds each to the winners below, and the last bottle of Pol Roger White Foil Champagne (NV) to Peter Hadley, whose neat title was 'Venus in Transit'. And our thanks to Messrs Dent and Reuss for having so generously provided the bonus champagne for 12 weeks.

She impinged in the park On the scene of my slight And demolished the dark Of my neighbourless night.

To my comfortless cave of Avernus came a magical moment of light.

As her optics met mine For a sixth of a second, It was surely a sign That her beauty had beckoned, And countless connubial kisses were the pledges they promised, I reckoned.

But the road to romance Wasn't quite as I planned — I perceived from a glance At her glove-denied hand Her penultimate sinister finger was ringed by a conjugal band. (Peter Hadley) Do you think 1 forgot That last night we'd a date To go out? What a clot I must seem! I was late, I freely admit it. The fact is 1 had far too much on my plate.

I may say, I did not Think it likely you'd wait - I'd have come like a shot, But an odd quirk of fate Distracted my thoughts. So I felt hopping mad as I heard it strike eight.

Now I have such a lot On my mind, such a weight Of remorse, tell me what Is to wipe clean the slate?

Will tears be enough? If they're not I'll be happy to grovel prostrate. (D. L. L. Clarke) With my spectacles steamed On the day we first kissed, I recoiled when you screamed (As I clumsily missed And my lips brushed your platinum ear-ring), 'God help us, the bloody clown's pissed!'

In a way it was true: I was utterly drunk With the essence of you: My existence had shrunk To the span of your giddiest impulse — when I told you, you simply said, 'Bunk!'

Though you scoffed at my love, And dismissed it as shrill, It was well that I strove, As I found with a thrill - When the cloud of your dying was lightened with a fat golden lining — your will! (Martin Fagg) 'My darling,' you breathe, 'If I were to die, I should want to bequeath My heart and each eye To the needs of the blind and the sickly; I hope you can understand why.'

Understand? Yes, of course, Your motives are fine.

I can only endorse Your desire to enshrine The objects I love in this world where we flourish and sweetly entwine.

But what of my plight When your left eye looks out From one lady, your right From another, without Any mention of where you heart is to be — in, perhaps, a Boy Scout? (Paul Griffin) If we had enough time We could dally all day And, while both in our prime, We could fondle and play, Discussing our love on and on, till at last there was no more to say.

But that really won't do - It's no way to behave.

For I've always in view The mouth of the grave, And the cold silent tomb is no place for the pleasures we crave.

So, while we've the chance, We must do what we will, We must lead love a dance, And never stand still.

What a marvellous ride we shall have before we