COMPETITION

A couple of birds

Jaspistos

I n Competition No. 1388 you were asked for a poem with the rhyme-scheme: shine, right, sight, mine, appalled, same, name, called, confounded, together, neither, com- pounded. The birds in question were Shakespeare's 'The Phoenix and the Tur- tle', as no fewer than twelve of you very cleverly, I thought, detected. Among these, the winner of the bonus £10, drawn by lot by a passing goddess of chance, proves to be Sandra Singer. The other winners below get £8 each, and the bottle of Veuve Clicquot Gold Label 1979 Vin- tage Champagne (the gift of NERA) I award to Basil Ransome-Davies in top form.

It's five to ten. I cannot rise and shine.

I cannot tell my left hand from my right.

The mirror shows a horrifying sight - A dying ape's reflection? No, it's mine.

However, I'm too numb to be appalled, And far too dehydrated. All the same, I should be able to recall my name.

`St Michael', says my pants, but am I called . . .?

No way. With senses totally confounded, I struggle to put two ideas together And give up in confusion, grasping neither. Of what was last night's yin de pays

compounded? (Basil Ransome-Davies) In the light of the headlamp they saw the thing shine As it lay in the culvert some yards to the right. They got out of the jeep and what greeted their sight Was a huge UXB, a formidable mine.

The lieutenant turned white and was clearly appalled,

And the corporal beside him no doubt felt the

same; Then he flung the device an unprintable name And at once for some wire and the pincers he called.

He probed, then said, 'Corp, it's sure got me confounded; I can't see the way the damn thing's put together.'

The corp scratched his ear and said, `Blimey, me neither.'

One mistake and they'd both be with fragments compounded. (0. Smith)

Moonshine Time right, Pretty sight—

Girl; mine!

Girl appalled Looked same, Strange name; Police called.

Hope confounded, Not together. Loving neither, Loss compounded. (D. A. Prince) Alas, I was not born to shine; I hardly know my left from right, But mystic statements please my sight, Like `Mine is his, and yours is mine.'

I'll tell you straight, I was appalled

When Hallam died. Life's not the same. I wrote a poem to his name:

In Memoriam it's called,

Now my confusion's worse confounded.

I've managed putting words together, I've managed rhyming them; but neither Alters the way I am compounded. (Paul Griffin) As a limerick-maker I'd shine

If I got the form right—

I'd be miles out of sight, There'd be none in the same class as mine, But, alas, I am somewhat appalled. My attempts at the same Really won't make my name, Nay, a doggerelist I'll be called.

By this form I'm completely confounded, I can't get it together (Does that rhyme with `neither'?).

The disaster by now is.compounded.

(Gerard Benson) My boots emit a most unnatural shine, My fellow conscripts stand to left and right, Two dozen khaki clones, a stirring sight For any soldier's eyes, but not for mine.

And now comes Sergeant-Major Briggs, appalled: It seems my bootlaces are not the same. He casts aspersions on my father's name And calls me things no enemy is called.

His code of morals utterly confounded, He wonders, bunching outraged brows together, Which lace is 'authorised'. I answer, 'Neither', And seal my fate, the felony compounded.

(Noel Petty)