COMPETITION

Hyper-inflation

Jaspistos

12 YEAR OLD SCOTCH WHISKY

In Competition No. 1643 you were in- vited to expand, pompously and periphras- tically, a well-known short poem or an adage.

I meant, in either case, 'into verse', which I should have thought was clear enough from the example I quoted (taken from The Feast of Lupercal by Brian Moore, who I hope will have the Booker Prize next month). All the same, some of you sent in prose: I'm sorry, I shall strain for even greater clarity in my announce- ments. I hope BR follow suit.

This week I entered the competition myself, hoping to persuade myself to place myself among the winners, unrewarded of

course. I chose Landor's annoying little poem, 'I strove with none . . .' Alas, I couldn't swing it. Mary Holtby had the same idea and executed it better. The fact that she overstepped the limit by four lines and is still among the prizewinners merely underlines the sweetness of my character.

The first two winners printed below get f15 each, and the rest £8. I welcome several talented newcomers, who ran

ctuVAS REG4

12 YEAR OLD SCOTCH WHISKY

close. The bonus bottle of Chivas Regal 12-year-old de luxe blended whisky is definitely won by Andrew McEvoy for his barbarous translation of Hopkins' 'Heaven-Haven', subtitled 'A nun takes the veil'.

(Here's GMI I: I have desired to go

Where springs not fail, To fields where flies no sharp and sided hail And a few lilies blow.

And I have asked to be Where no storms come, Where the green swell is in the havens dumb And out of the swing of the sea.) My conceptualisation of domiciliary ideality Posits a high index of orthodox vernality, Of cumulonimbus-projected ice pellets a marked frugality, And of liliaceous efflorescences a mild prodigality.

The acme of my residential desideration Is a location subject to no barometric tergiversation, Where marine undulations refrain from.all conversation — In short, an ongoing non-agitation stagnation situation.

(Andrew McEvoy) 'I strove with none, for none was worth my

strife . . (Walter Savage Landor)

No sole or single personage Provoked my martial inclination, Since with inferiors to engage Is nothing short of degradation.

'[be cosmos in its primal state Inspired my principal affection; Second in sequence would I rate Forms of aesthetical projection.

Existence spread its igneous glow: I faced the cheerful conflagration And, thermally infiltered so, Approached with manual duplication.

A diminution of the flame Occurs when natural wastage checks it, And!, returning whence I came, Am quite prepared to make my exit.

(Mary Holtby) 'He first deceased; she for a little tried To live without him: liked it not, and died.'

(Sir Henry Wotton) His earlier egress from this earthly station Inspired her to attempt a sole existence. The brief endeavour met her heart's resistance, Whereat she entertained inanimation.

(Grani de Morgan) Absence makes the heart grow fonder The cockled chamber warms far less In hot proximity's embrace Then when in sundered separateness It yearns across disjunctive space.

(W. J. Webster) There's many a slip 'twixt cup and lip Between his drinking vessel And his labial projection The prudest man, I guess, 'II Proceed with circumspection, For a single careless motion May precipitate the potion. (Peter Hadley) A watched pot never boils The culinary vessel which attracts The over-zealous gaze of anxious maid Will not attain the seething heat required By either Fahrenheit or Centigrade.

(D. A. Prince) Beggars can't be choosers The mendicant whom indigence compels From wealthier men to seek some benefaction Must take what they will offer him, or else Agree to discontinue the transaction.

(M. Mortimer) You can't have you cake and eat it Should you admire the baker's sugared ware And be persuaded to ingest a slice, With manly fortitude its absence bear: Nature forbids you to consume it twice.

(Annie Brooks)