The Oldie "Toast rack" results
I'm going to sound a bit grumpy but it's ambiguous to say "In Competition No 165 you were invited to write a poem on a toast rack".
"... about a toast rack", surely? Never mind, but "instument" is a clumsy mistake (yes, everything below is exactly as it appears in The Oldie magazine; I get the results in pdf format so it's not my typing that's at fault!)
It's a pity when poems are spoiled through careless copying though. OK, I'll stop whingeing now -- congrats to Spherians Peter Wyton and Bill Greenwell.
Jayne
(Next competition on a new thread.)
The Oldie Competition
by Tessa Castro
IN COMPETITION NO 165 you were invited to write a poem on a toast rack.
Alixe Bainbridge-Spring was glad to discover that the object holds six CDs. Peter Wyton had one as Victory on his grandfather’s breakfast table, with the marmalade pot as Admiral Villeneuve. All went well till an attempt to fight the Battle of Britain with knives and forks bent the tea-strainer.
Gillian Southgate began: ‘Phone for the toast rack, Norman,’ but soon became overwhelmed by the glory of undyed haddock. Bill Webster put his finger on the unsatisfactory status of a toast rack, ‘Not heirloom stuff, more bric-à-brac.’
Katie Mallett remembered a different kind of toast rack – the little train that rattled the 1.34 miles to the end of Southend Pier. Mary Hodges’s ‘Toast Rack’ was the cookery and catering building in Manchester, memories of which ‘Will fade like toast gone cold.’
David Beanland wondered what kind of person writes letters to newspapers, about toast racks, or anything else. Much the same kind, perhaps, who write competitive verse.
Commiserations to these and congratulations to those below, each of whom wins £25, with the bonus prize of a Chamber’s Biographical Dictionary going to this month’s toast of the page, Maggie Spooner.
Now what on Mars, they wondered, could it be,
this artefact? – With curiosity
the spacey diggers hunkered near the ground
to theorize on what they thought they’d found.
and, vying, voiced without compunction
unfounded claims to understand its function.
‘I tell you it’s an instument of torture,
a talisman, a tool, a piece of Porsche,
a sharpener for knives, a decoration…’
The site was all a-buzz with speculation
and a bee it was whose keen proboscis
led them to the ‘lightbulb’ diagnosis.
‘A taste of sweetness gave the game away,’
announced the Prof, ‘and I can safely say
this object (our laboratory has shown)
revered by Earthlings, is – a Toblerone.’
Maggie Spooner
The toast rack stood cold and impassive
where the waiter had clattered it down,
I’d ordered the rough-cut farmhouse,
she’d ordered the wholemeal brown.
I smiled at her over that toast rack,
she blushed and looked down at her plate,
my farmhouse was shouting, ‘I love you,’
but her wholemeal was whispering ‘Wait!’
I engaged her in talk of the weather
as a way of controlling my lust,
then I noticed her thin brown wholemeal
had rested its head on my crust.
Her wholemeal slipped onto the table,
my farmhouse leaned over the brink,
and as for that cold, haughty toast rack?
Could have sworn that it gave me a wink!
Peter Davies
I’ve been buying up toast racks for years,
Amassing a major collection
Of historic and rare souvenirs
Which I keep at the bank for protection.
I’ve a Fabergé, jewel-encrusted,
That belonged to the last, tragic tsar
And one that is heavily rusted
But was Hemingway’s on the Pilar.
I’ve Hitler’s, a monstrous mutation
With swastikas carved on the base,
While Escher’s exerts fascination
As it plays silly buggers with space.
It’s a specialist corner I’ve captured,
Quite unique (though I don’t like to boast)
And the objects that leave me enraptured
Will all go to the Tate when I’m toast.
G M Davis
The first slice in the rack is hot
And swallows up the butter
As fast as any speeding shot,
Or hard-hit daisycutter.
The second slice is warm and moist,
A pleasure to be spread,
A slice on eating which you hoist
An inner flag for bread.
The third slice has begun to cool:
The butter lies there, proud,
A heart-attack that all old fools
Can recognise, heads bowed.
The final slice is frozen stiff,
Defeats the hearty eater.
The butter’s slab. You feel as if
You might prefer Ryvita.
Bill Greenwell
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