[Nicholas Stone]

BoJo no-go.

Shall I do it?
Shall I do it?
Shall I do it?
Shall I do it?

Shall I do it?
Shall I do it?
Shall I do it?
No.

Farage triumphans

We've taken the country back.
You can feel it in the air.
The bunting's fluttering on the breeze,
There's cod and chips with mushy peas.
Jean Claude Juncker's going spare.
We've taken the country back.

[Jerome Betts]

The Slithy Goves

That Michael's a rat with a spine
Seems for now the majority line
Though there is the suggestion
That it's open to question
And perhaps it was all Sarah Vine.

[Martin Parker]

To the Man who wrote The World's Worst Limerick

Serve you bloody right!

[Jerome Betts]

Hear! Hear! I'd forgotten that piece of deception, all of a piece with the rest of his act. Meanwhile . . .

Give reptilian Rupert a say!
Let the Boricide Gove have his day!
Such spinners and twisters
Will be mere passing blisters
As after October comes May.

[Julie Steiner]

Well, the Spectator did, after all, call it the President Erdogan Offensive Poetry Contest. And everyone seems to agree that favoring a celebrity's mediocre entry--after disingenuously inviting entries from the entire English-speaking world, as if all the rest of us lowly scribblers actually had a shot--was an offensive way to run a poetry contest. Indeed, it evokes the cronyism and abuse of public trust associated with President Erdogan. So I'd have to say it was truth in advertising.

(Announcing that rhymes on "Ankara" were deprecated, and then choosing a winner containing exactly that, was a particularly offensive touch, I thought. Inspired!)

[Matt Q]

Know only this my secret lover:
that I will be with you, whatever.
Though none can know of our affair,
I promise to stay true.
................................– T. Blair.

[John Whitworth]

Julie, it was Douglas Murray's money, not the Speccie's. He is surely entitled to do what he likes with it. Or are you a Socialist?