COMPETITION

Yet again

Jaspistos

In Competition No. 1525 you were asked for Shakespeare's newly discovered 'woe- ful ballad to his mistress' eyebrows'. Considering people's tendency to find What they're looking for, I'm surprised that so few 'Shakespearian' poems have been discovered. Since Samuel Ireland's forgery Vortigern was staged by Sheridan as the Bard's own work, scepticism has been the order of the day. Before judging this competition, I amused myself by reading Shaw's 'improvement' on the last act of CYmbeline. Despite the fact that there's n. ot a line of real poetry in it, it's not a bad Job. But the imitator has to be self- effacing, and GBS just couldn't keep it up. Near the end Guiderius suddenly sounds Incongruously like King Magnus in The Apple Cart:

'Oh no, sir: give me back the dear old cave And my unflattering four footed friends.

I abdicate, and pass the throne to Polydore .

When it came to the winners, I couldn't afford to be too strict: anachronisms and Caroline rather than Jacobean touches have been winked at. Good losers were Gina Berkeley, D. E. Poole, M. R. Macin- tyre, June F. Langfield and C. F. Lobel (though only the Player King could have apostrophised an eyebrow '0 hispid fim- briation!'). The winners below are awarded £12 each. Goodbye and good luck

for the next six weeks.

Thou arched Cupid's bow of fairest hue, From those dear eyes shoot forth one piercing dart,

And wound again, as thou wast wont to do, The burning target of this lover's heart. Would thou couldst tell what evil destiny Hath changed my lady's love to bitter scorn, Ploughed furrows ' twixt thy other self and thee And left me all forgotten and forlorn. Were Ito match her mood with like disdain Wouldst thou be raised in counterfeit surprise, And would it please her then to mock my pain And fill the air with falsely doting sighs? Whate'er betide, my love is constant still: I rest content if she doth have her will.

(0. Smith) Haughty, vain triumphal arch, Who gave thee power to rule my days, My knees to quake, my mind to craze, My very lips to burn and parch?

Since thou art vassal too, proud feature, More abject I, who humbly crave A token even from the slave Of sweet perfection's loveliest creature.

Yet peace, my soul, here's this for balm: When men in tavern meet and boast Which one doth love his mistress most, Doubly enslaved, I'll bear the palm.

(Noel Petty) My Gertrude's eyebrows fill me with despair, They are the platform of her contradictions; For one — the right — is but a flash of hair, The other is not subject to restrictions. One moment it's a sated, languid stoat That stretches out above a rabbit hole, The next a castaway's unsteady boat That tussles with the helmsman for control; Arched like a rainbow it entraps my lust, Then, lost in sympathy for some waif's need Is knit; it shows when Gertrude is nonplussed Or crossed, or sly, or ready to concede. It shows her mind, but has not in its scope To show her heart or give me cause to hope.

(J. C. M. Hepple) Does that switch above thy brow Yet possess the witch's art To revive or still my heart? If it does, pray tell me how.

When it lifts in fairest smiles, Light invades the grimmest night. When it droops in woe or spite, Summer sun no more beguiles.

Like the rainbow, let that arc Be a testament of love, Bidding me, when all is dark, Look for favour from above.

(Basil Ransome-Davies) Let the supercilious fair Strive with me no longer; By the twitching of one hair She is prov'd the stronger.

So let me raise My mistress' praise, However scornful be her gaze.

Now the arching of her brow Bends against me sternly; Cupid's arrow from his bow Never struck more yearnly.

So let me quail Whene'er she rail: Lovers' hearts are meek and frail.

(Simon Rees) Like a slim grilse that leaps the river's stair My mistress' eyebrow arches at my quip; I know this moving statement is but hair Yet would I test its temper with my lip.

For sometime it to my bleak eye appears As the formation of a fierce platoon Which makes a forest of pursuing spears And I, their quarry, will be pierced and hewn. And sometime, like the cock-bird of the brace, This pheasant-brow bows down to sue his mate And all the concentration of her face

Is met to make prescription of my fate:

Then mesmerised by that expressive frieze I sickly fear I strove too hard to please. (Ginger Jelinek)