[John Whitworth]

I don't really see how there could be half a dozen better than that, Bazza. You will surely win again.

[John Whitworth]

Neverthless I shall try it. I suppose Chaucer would hardly have written in limericks.

The Tattooist’s Tale

When the ships are in port then the crews
Spend night after night on the booze,
And when well off their faces
They seek out the places
Where fellows like me do tattoos.

If they come with the cash I tattooes ‘em –
Naked ladies with acres of bosom,
Cute callipygous dames,
But as to their names?
I suggest it’s much better to lose ‘em.

On my life, said a wife once, ‘God rot ‘em all!’
When she spied ‘em inscribed on his bottom, all
The names of the tail he’
-d been rogering daily.
She took a revolver and shot ‘em all

[Martin Parker]

It is years since I tried the Oldie. I did once win a bottle of whisky, but I suspect that this possible entry reflects my total lack of interest in teasets.

Tailpiece

I’m tattooed with the names of the women I’ve loved
And my whole epidermis is covered
Except for the last private inch of my flesh
Which has been so exhaustively lovered.

You tell me, sweet Stephanie Fortescue-french
That your name would not fit on this site
Since the space would not stretch to the requisite length.
But I think, at my best, it just might.

[Jerome Betts]

Yes, Bazza's out in front as usual. Should be a good subject but somehow . . . Wonder what R.P. Lister would have made of it? Thought, pace John, I'd try a sort of shambling sub-
Chaucerian pentameter but not sure I'll enter the results.

Edited out -new version posted 12 Sept.

[Steve Bucknell]

Love this, Jerome, like especially:

"Then further down, in regions known as ‘nether’,
Depict crude scenes referring to the weather,"

The mind boggles as to what that could possibly mean!

But the last couplet is too prosaic, not the clincher you need.

[Jerome Betts]

Steve, best left to the reader's lurid imagination! Yes, you've noticed I'm plotless with this one. I will substitute

And thereby met his noisome Waterloo
When, wits awash with whisky, roaring drunk,
He sank his needle in a friend's pet skunk.

Not much better clincher-wise, though. Maybe a bettter competition would be trying to supply the wording or design that Bazza would now be baring on the beach if his tattooist had been less scrupulous.

[Roger Slater]

They came to me with little sense
believing in love's permanence
and trusting my ungainly art
to brand them with a name or heart.
How many thousands later rued
the images that I tattooed?
My guess is far more than a few.
Love fades. Unlike a good tattoo.
.
.
.