Speccie Past Regrets by 19th December
 

This is a fairly standard one. Someone wil be able to tell me when it was done before. But not by me alas.

No. 2778: Past regrets
You are invited to submit your regret, in verse, for New Year’s resolutions not kept (16 lines maximum). Please email entries, wherever possible, to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 19 December.

In only 16ll?

My Resolutions

The cigarettes I did not quit,
The belt I did not shrink to fit,
The novel that I left undone,
The marathon I did not run,
The money that I did not save,
The charity I never gave,
The exercise I did not do,
The bites I took but did not chew,
The mountains that I never scaled,
The oceans that I never sailed,
Abide, regretful friends of mine.
Let's take a cup for auld lang syne.

Confessions of a New Year's Slacker
 

I know I ought to be more altruistic;
But, in my heart, I'm grimly realistic.
The resolutions that I made last year
Have come to naught again, I'll tell you here:

My tax return was still a work of fiction.
The jokes I laughed at stir up ethnic friction.
I never did adopt a shelter puppy,
And called my son-in-law a frigging yuppie.

Asparagus and kale weren't in my diet;
If whiskey was in soy-milk, I might try it.
Poetically, I plagiarized the dead;
And Britney Spears, I still would love to bed.

I didn't give a dime to PBS ...
And think I did some drugs to slight excess.
Tonight, I'll pledge to be a better person ...
But, twelve months hence, you'll only find a worse'un.

What's your PBS, Douglas? Would a Brit recognise it? To me, it means the Poetry Book Society (founded by T S Eliot in the fifties). But since it's a dime you're giving and not a pound, perhaps our natural insularity will be overcome by the fun.

And Roger, I'll take a guid-willie waught with you!

PBS demystified
 

Ann,
PBS is the Public Broadcasting Service in the US. It is partly supported by a wide vrriety of educational and non-profit institutions, and supplemented by foundation grants , corporate sponsorships, and the general public.

The "general public" is bombarded by periodic pledge drives (if they watch PBS). Their programming is good (including many recycled UK shows), but the guilt-inducing pledge drives grow old quite soon. Now that many Americans have cable TV (with about 100 channels), I think PBS is feeling some competition; and it seems their pledge drives are increasing.

I could have sworn I posted this. Perhaps I did in the wrong place. I wanted to know whether flunked or funked would be better.

Past Regrets

It's the season of cheer for another New Year
As we dance in the next Saturnalia,
But before I forget, let me say I regret
One conspicuous record of failure.

In my honest belief, not to turn a new leaf
Shows a habit unmannered and boorish,
But I nevertheless am obliged to confess
My success in these matters is poorish.

I declare with remorse, when I swore off the sauce
The resolve scarcely lasted the week out.
Ditto gaming with dice and unnatural vice,
To eschew them just caused me to freak out.

Though sincere in my sorrow today and tomorrow
For yesterday's promises flunked,
This year I'm afraid the whole harlequinade
Will be quite comprehensively junked.

John,
I would stay with "flunked".

Another Adieu
 

Mon dieu! Last year I meant to leave you,
a girl whose dark charms grew
for seven long unholy years
after we said, I do.

Oh no, I must be rid of you,
whose spells still turn me blue,
moving me to violent tears
with magic words you spew.

It’s true, this time I’m leaving you,
who melts my mind to glue,
and daily digs my heart out
to boil it in your brew.

Now know, I’m going, cursing you:
your tongue's a torture screw
racking me to finally shout,
next year, you witch, we’re through!


Racked Ralph

I concur. 'Funk' to me rather evokes fear, a failure of nerve; whereas 'flunk' suits failing a test, whether in a formal examination or (as here) a failure of resolve.

A fine piece of verse, John!

'Past Regrets'
 

Past Regrets

A twelve-month past, I’m sure I set
My heart to work on what I loved the best.
Did I begin? Did I try yet?
My resolution slumped; I do not pass the yearly test.

A year or more it was, ago,
That I swore I’d bring home 'no more such junk!'
The process has continued, though;
My attic and my outhouse overflow. That oath was bunk.

My skills lie boxed-in on the shelf,
A trove unopened. Where’s the merit sweet?
It seems I still defeat myself;
What honours do I gain by such long, wholesale, self-deceit?
[or ‘What does it profit me – such long-stored, wholesale, self-deceit?’]

Truth told, I dread to try and fail
[or ‘Truth told, I fear attempts may fail,’ – any better?]
In some way I do not control or choose;
And so (this paradox, my tale!)
By changing not, I win at least this: certainty I’ll lose.


[The poem is about hoarding supposedly-useful materials, to the point that they crowd out scope for actually making anything of them. But I'm not confident I put that across sufficiently here. All comments welcome.]

Thank you Graham, Douglas. I shall keep it as it is.

I swore I’d give up sex and saturnalia;
That was my optimistic resolution.
So no more “escorts” (farewell, Chloë, Thalia) -
A euphemistic term for prostitution.
No steamy vice, no lurid bacchanalia;
I’d join the straight-and-narrow revolution;
I’d throw away my S & M regalia,
And purify my vicious constitution.
I’d smoke no more; my teeth were growing scalier
And yellower from nicotine pollution.
I’d tend my garden, prune my white azalea;
My life would be impeccably Confucian.

I might as well have tried to eat Australia;
I broke each vow, preferring dissolution.
But this year, there’ll be no such moral failure -
I’m quite resolved to make no resolution.

Love those alias!

Good one, Brian.

Clever one, Brian.. and a bold effective step to use only those two rhymes, alternating throughout!

Past Regrets

I wish my life had been less serious!
Many times I waxed severe.
Now I lie here, weak, delirious -
Candle faint - but thought is clear

On one point – sharply! - from my past:
I yearly thought to mend my ways
While thinking “Long my life will last”-
Unguessing soon to end my days;

Procrastinating then to fix
Those character-faults I should rue:
That silly feud, the mean sly tricks
By which I got ‘one up’ on you!

I know now: when my life is gone,
Ill thoughts of me will long abide.
For here I fall; and you look on,
Your dagger buried in my side.

New Years Resolution

Someday when I am thin, well-read,
with flaws but Lilliputian,
I will forgo the yearly farce
of New Year's resolution

whereby as clock hands join as one
I promise, once they've parted,
a better day, a better year,
for me will then get started,

and yet I know this day won't come;
the earth will keep revolving,
and I will make myself content
to be here still resolving.

A last-minute attempt
 

I absolutely swore I'd give up Flakes,
and Mars bars, Twix, Maltesers, Chocolate Buttons -
but when I'm at the checkout all it takes
is seeing that array. Like many gluttons
I'm weak and my resistance goes to pot,
without the slightest waver on my part.
I said I'd give up chocolate. I have not.
(To tell the truth, I didn't even start !)

Oh, I regret my lack of will-power now.
My Resolution was a waste of time.
I've let myself down very badly. How
could I have been so spineless? It's a crime
allowing 'want' to turn to desperate 'need'.
Succumbing to temptation is the Devil's
work; he loves us to resort to greed.
... It's ages since I bought a bag of Revels...

A very tasty piece, Jayne.