The Weekly Muse

A Russian Spacebug Eats Your Pants...

Though practical, it lacks romance

And science has moved on apace

In space-pant/hygiene interface.

If cosmonauts are cheerier

With pant-cleaning bacteria

It wasn't what I had in mind

In boyhood dreams I left behind:

"Major Tom to Ground Control -

I think these pants have got a hole"

And human cloning by next year?

A heart, a lung, a nose, an ear -

The possibilities are vast,

A real Body Shop at last:

"Don't Phone Us - We'll Clone You!

Replacement parts as good as new

Allow a fortnight at the most

And pop your details in the post."

Not everyone will think it's right,

But two in every one men might.

It's knives out for Clare Short again:

Perhaps you chaps with half a brain

Should just remember now and then

That cosying up to businessmen

Would not be foremost in her sights.

Her working brief is human rights

And smashing poorer nations' chains,

Not flogging engines, guns or planes.

Her critics in particular

Should cast a glance at Chechnya:

No houses, doctors, schools or jobs,

Just jeeploads full of well-armed yobs.

Not trustworthy? Our record charts?

Prone to manipulation?

Record company marketing

Controls the situation,

Where radio stations play the songs

To give them full support

Until the public knuckle down

And discs are duly bought.

Assuming that we're stupid,

Which they seem to take as fact,

They'll badger and cajole us

Till we buy their tawdry act.

The problem with this arrogance

Is that they're selling pap

And flies are most attracted

To the bigger piles of crap,

So lots of competition

Helps to keep them on their toes.

The issue here's the class of crap,

As Lord Lloyd Webber knows.