The Weekly Muse

A blue moon due tomorrow night

When January shuffles out

And February lumbers in,

Ill-tempered as a case of gout,

His chamberpot of stale rain

Brimful of lukewarm winter days,

A half-day closing firebug sun

To set the sulking clouds ablaze.

The disappearing apple.

There's a subject for a poet.

The dreaming English orchards

Were the places where they'd grow it -

The russet and the Blenheim

Or the rough old d'Arcy Spice -

But the supermarket buyers

Think they wouldn't look as "nice"

As those waxy plastic objects

Which you see them putting out,

And as all their adverts tell you:

Choice - it's what it's all about.

More sex pervading everything...

The media's full of sex

And prurient fascination

With concave and convex.

The latest thing to crop up

On an over-stuffed agenda

Is the Old Vic's new production

On the theme of the pudenda.

This yonic veneration,

Though it isn't quite a play,

Asks the thought-provoking question:

"If it talked, what would it say?"

Vaginal conversation?

Not the sort of thing I'd try,

But even if it happened

How the hell would I reply?

A perfume firm, American,

Has launched a certain winner.

I gave some to my girlfriend

Last evening over dinner:

The subtle scent of "Essex"

Is sweetly charismatic,

The high note's Harwich Harbour,

The undertone's emphatic -

A Billericay boot fair,

A whiff of car-interior,

A hint of Thorpe-le-Soken,

And something far superior -

An Elmstead Market feed-shed?

A dog on Clacton sands?

My hostess smelled of lager.

I was putty in her hands.