COMPETITION

Sexameters

Jaspistos

In Competition No. 1547 you were in- vited to write some English hexameters begining with the words 'I am in love, meantime . . .'

Clough, that chronic doubter, typically ended the section of 'Amours de Voyage' which began with those words, 'I am in love, you say: I do not think so exactly.' Apart from him, I reckon that only Day Lewis (in the first section of An Italian Visit) really pulled off the adaptation of that alien metre. It was a tough competi- tion, and hexameters sprawl, so there's only room for four prizewinners, truly palmary ones, who get an unexpected £20 each Peter Hadley, Paul Griffin, Alcuin Davies, Frances Orme and Nicholas Mur- ray all earned admiration. M. R. Macin- tyre scoops the bonus bottle of Château Cantemerle 1979, kindly donated by Asshetons, Solicitors, 99 Aldwych, Lon- don WC2.

I am in love, meantime, if that's not a grandiose statement.

Not for the space of a moment (this much is definite) can I Get her away from my mind, whom all day long I must follow — Not unskilfully, either, in my susceptible forties. Modern practices, too, can give one a useful advantage.

Small groups— seminars, call them, or possibly ad hoc committees —

Flourish, as well you know, throughout 'academic' occasions.

Seeing that she was in mine proved quite unpredictably easy.

There, as I made clear how she could cope with her ludicrous sixth form,

Green eyes clung to my face, their expression admiring and grateful,

Dizzying, dazzling, exacting excitement, although we had never Even by chance touched fingers. However, I think that with patience Much may be done, and my first sortie is already determined.

That is, to offer on Friday, the conference being concluded,

Casually if I can do it, to give her a lift back to London.

Will she say, 'Thank you so much, but my husband is coming to meet me'? (M. R. Macintyre) I am in love, meantime I am out of grace with my tutor. Studies neglected, I pen little lyrics and doleful sonnets All composed on the theme of my mistress's marvellous eyebrows, Crying my love to a heedless world in rhyming iambics. (Truly, I try my hand at pseudo-Elizabethan Gooey confections in not-very-skilfully-moulded iambics!)

As to my last two essays: gamma and gamma minus—

'Hardly the sort of marks one expects from a Sullivan Scholar.'

Father O'Railly will turn in his grave, no doubt, and let him!

How are the mighty fallen! I whose cell was the library,

I who stuck like a tick to his Kennedy's Latin Primer,

I who have won the O'Carolan Prize for Narrative Sapphics, Now make trite little versicles under the spell of Erato; And, what is more, I like it. As to the lady-love (nameless),

She is somewhat amused, I think, but all the same flattered,

For she has taken to calling herself 'The Undark Lady'.

(C. J. D Doyle) I am in love, meantime she's suggesting we go meet her parents, Colonel Sir Archibald James Fitzlvor (and Lady Fitzlvor),

Residence: Tarlington Towers (near Buckingham); Club: Athenaeum.

First let me try and forecast what the chit-chat will be before dinner . . .

Colonel Sir Archie: 'You hunt?' *Well, yes, sir, but only the slipper' - No, dammit, that's the wrong tone! (He'll be bound then to summon the butler And in a couple of shakes have me clapped into irons in a dungeon!) Or, work out what will be her mama's conversational gambit: 'Tell me, Fiona, remind me — where was it, again, you young people Met?' And Fiona will say, 'At a super pop concert at Wembley.'

'Wembley!' mama will repeat (and she'll make the word sound like 'A handbag!').

(Pause) 'A pop concert!' she'll add, with a scarcely perceptible shudder.

O my Fiona Fitzlvor, reflect: if love were a walnut,

Could any hard upper crust then daunt a determined nutcracker?

Sweet is the heart of a nut: it's of vital importance, Fiona, Sweet husky thing, that you now lend a hand at my crack with the Colonel! (P. I. Fell) I am in love, meantime, I fear, and it's perfectly dreadful.

Farewell the tranquil mind, and my snug little cosy existence,

Back to the heartstopping ride on the soarings and swoops of emotion,

Back to the nail-biting wait for the long-delayed letter or phone-call.

These belong to my past — they are ludicrous now in my present.

Look at it how you will, this is quite idiotic of Eros.

Could he have found if he tried a more unsuitable victim - Grey-haired, putting on weight, with even a touch of arthritis, ('Fading the taper waist . . .', as Gilbert brutally puts it)?

Give me a few more years and I shall be drawing my pension - Then, surely then I'll be safe? But it can't be denied, in the meantime I am in love again — and all the foundations are shaken.

(Kate Cottrell)