[Jayne Osborn]

We like the bouts-rimés comps, don't we? The words come from this Wendy Cope sonnet:

The expense of spirits is a crying shame,
So is the cost of wine. What bard today
Can live like old Khayyam? It's not the same---
A loaf and thou and Tesco's Beaujolais.
I had this bird called Sharon, fond of gin---
Could knock back six or seven. At the price
I paid a high wage for each hour of sin
And that was why I only had her twice.
Then there was Tracy, who drank rum and coke,
So beautiful I didn't mind at first.
But love grows colder. Now some other bloke
Is subsidizing Tracy and her thirst.
I need a woman, honest and sincere,
Who'll come across on half a pint of beer.

...so all we have to do now is find umpteen different takes on those words, right?

Jayne

The Oldie Competition
by Tessa Castro

Competition no 194
It’s time for the ever-popular game of old bouts-rimés. A poem of 14 lines, please, using as rhymes these words in this order:
shame, today, same, Beaujolais, gin, twice, sin, price, Coke, first, bloke, thirst, sincere, beer.

Entries, by post (The Oldie, 65 Newman St, London W1T 3EG) or email comps@theoldie.co.uk to ‘Competition no 194’ by 18th Sept. Don’t forget to include your postal address.

[Nigel Mace]

TRULY TEARFUL

Dijon’s pleurants weep, not for grief but shame,
which rests where missing mourners rest today,
for counterfeits are losses just the same,
as blended Beaune or bogus Beaujolais.
Purists, like Rheims’ jackdaw, must mind that gin
now set for those who cannot see that twice
times copied tears are just as much a sin -
though half a thousand years has raised their price.
As ’cross the world wash wastes of conjured Coke,
let all recall that those who wept tears first
tasted their salt in truth, unlike that bloke
whose medicine just ministered to thirst.
Though John’s and Cleveland’s copies seem sincere,
it’s wise to check for fakes around one’s bier.

[Brian Allgar]

[Second thoughts]

[Jerome Betts]

It’s true, alas, I hang my head in shame,
I cheated with my council waste today.
The unrecyclables are not the same
As bottles of Chablis or Beaujolais
Or last year’s presentation Plymouth Gin.
I’m sure it’s only happened once or twice -
Let him first cast the stone who does not sin
And via bulging land-fill pay the price!
I’d rather get force-fed that foulness, Coke,
Or shoved into a pile of dung head-first
Than be the sort of unenlightened bloke
Whose planet-saving zeal’s not like a thirst.
I will reform, in this I am sincere,
And hope past faults are, globally, small beer.

[Brian Allgar]

[Second thoughts]

[Brian Allgar]

[Second thoughts]

[Roger Slater]

I know it's best, and yet it seems a shame
That I have not yet had a drink today.
(I did have tea, but that is not the same
As vodka, say, or even Beaujolais,
Though I am partial, most of all, to gin).

Sobriety itself comes with a price
Exorbitant as any wage of sin,
And so I forswore drink not once, but twice,
Subsisting on just crystal meth and coke.
(I thought it best to deal with drinking first).

I'm proud to say, I am a drinking bloke
No longer. There are ways to slake one's thirst
Without imbibing. Yes, I am sincere.
I drink no more. (Unless you're counting beer).

[Susan Breeding]

Song of Free Will

In full disclosure found on walls of shame,
Thélème opened its broad church doors today
While Bacchus and his harem did the same.
They drank the liquid text of Beaujolais
And found a bright green traffic light at the gin
Palace around the block they circled twice
To find an even better text for sin.
Their choir sang semiquavers for a price
Intoning the liturgy of snow-white Coke.
And free will reigned upon the street, the first
Rule against rules designed to set a bloke
On a hard day’s bender that would slake his thirst
For the mad grotesquerie that all sincere
Disciples seek in an empty glass of beer.

[RCL]

My years of chastity a crying shame,
I saw a chance for change at lunch today
When noting she and I ordered the same:
Petite steak, pomme frites and Beaujolais.
Already high from drinking beer and gin,
I revved up confidence, said Hi there twice.
My senses sharp, I craved a carnal sin,
No longer cared about the moral price.
Good luck! She spilled a glass of rum and Coke.
Though I stood to help, he got there first,
And as he dabbed her dry, she hugged the bloke,
Who ordered rounds to feed her boundless thirst.
And when he left with her, his tone sincere,
Dad left me there, and I cried in my beer.

[Jayne Osborn]

Well, stone the crows! Although I enjoy doing bouts-rimés, there was I, thinking this was going to be tough - what a brilliant lot you are

I go out for a day, and come home to find Nigel, Jerome, Bob, Susan and Ralph have all done one already, and Brian's done three. (Welcome, Susan, by the way!)

Jayne