Jonathan Finch
I’ll tell of a time when,
in the roguish months of the dirtiest year,
Clifford Claxx took his pale face
to the aghast mirror
and had a good gawp,
ah, and it was horrible.
What a mean visage was there! –
wolfish, cruel and lecherous.
“What’s to be done?” thought Clifford Claxx.
Outside his window
the flaxen populace pulsed on.
A dismal man listened
to the most dismally stereotyped, piped song.
A tiny child sucked her hands
and got a very good dose of lead fall-out.
A trout turned up on its belly
in the stream, signifying liver cancer.
“What’s to be done?” thought Clifford Claxx.
Over the way,
where it was all not happening,
Frederick Patty-Pott happened to see
Clifford Claxx getting on his (Frederick’s ) spiffing new motor-bike
and roaring off down the road.
Frederick Patty-Pott, not quick
on the uptake, scratched his long head.
“Urrrgggh?” he thought,
then gave up.
Meanwhile, Clifford Claxx
was trying to do a ton
like a right good ‘un but only succeeded
in disturbing the local refuse-collector
who was having a quiet kip
in one of the council’s cleaner dust-shoots.
“You…..!” he screeched, disturbed,
to Clifford Claxx who waved a dismal hand.
The bright sun clapped its eye shut
on Clifford Claxx who went under
while Frederick Patty-Pott was the subject
of a sociological investigation which killed him.
The bottle where we do our daily round is huge.
It’s full of poison, vilification, and disease.
The tunnel-funnel is huge where we begin our gurgle-down,
and now, in our perverted circus, we repress our clown.
