And no blank verse in sight.

This is too lovely.

I've just read the latest from Ann and Nigel, both excellent.

Ann, "Sod pulchritude" is the snappiest beginning to a competition entry I've seen since someone (I can't remember who) started a reply to Larkin with "You lying toad!"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"and put away
Your pert Pirelli-pictures, with their stains
Of secret substances"

is agreeably yucky.

Brian, youb are a curious kind of a genius.

Brian,
However did I guess that you'd do a spoof version? ;)

Here's my afternoon's toil:

“Those patterned sweaters are so dated! Plains
are “in”, have been for ever and a day,”
I said. “Just throw the whole damn lot away;
they’re dull, old-fashioned, shabby, full of stains.”

My Dad, a martyr to his aches and pains,
a widower for eight years, come this May,
has given up on life. He doesn’t play
his friends at bowls, or golf (“It always rains”),
or dress up smartly, and he scarcely leaves
the house, except for short strolls if the sun’s
out and he’s bored. I’m going round with sheaves
of bumf for singles’ clubs... I hold my breath:

"You mean... you wouldn’t mind?” Great! Now he runs
around with Pearl. He used to wait for death.

Good one, Jayne!

Conquering Death

Her belly, as flat as the Plains,
has been shrinking each hour and day
as she languishes, wasting away,
her battery scarred with the stains
of corrosion, her virtual pains
as distant as Deneb. It’s May.
Her buddies are busy at play,
though she doesn’t take note if it rains
or the maple and oak shed their leaves
or the sky has five moons and three suns.
The specialist studies some sheaves
on her illness, releases a breath
and, after some tests that he runs,
recharges her, conquering death.


Version 2 (more concrete):

Her tires, as flat as the Plains,
have been leaking each hour and day,
her fuel nearly frittered away,
her body all blotched with the stains
of corrosion. Her doctor takes pains
to examine the symptoms. It’s May.
She imagines her buddies at play,
sleeker than seals when it rains,
lighter than wind-carried leaves,
content as a million suns.
Now the doc, having glanced through some sheaves,
takes her battery and a deep breath
and, after some tests that he runs,
recharges her, conquering death.

Imponderable Sheaves

You ponder the expanse of the Great Plains
measured against the earth (which in a day
drifts millions of miles), then looking farther away
at Jupiter, you see its smallest stains
can swallow earth and moon combined. The pains
you take to grasp infinity just may
yield whys and wherefores by the truckload. Play
with facts and figures, sometimes wisdom’s rains
come pouring down. But nature mostly leaves
you baffled as an earless bat. Old suns
and newborn suns, imponderable sheaves
of stuff out there, like molecules of breath,
disperse. You probe the cosmos as it runs
its course, and know its birth is in its death.

A very nice piece, Jayne.

As to how you guessed I'd do something so uncharacteristic as writing a spoof piece, it's a complete mystery to me.

Martin, I like both yours, and especially, in the second one, "baffled as an earless bat".

John - why, thank'ee, Squire (tugs forelock).

Thank you, Martin and Brian.

I'm still chasing no. 3 for that elusive Bouts rimés hat trick but I'm up against it; the standard of the entries here is so high!

Jayne

Instead of running round like a bunch of headless chickens wouldn't it be easier simply to do exactly what it says on the tin? After all, Keats managed it even though he was sick!

But be got to pick his own rhymes. No one made him use
"sheaves."