The first sign of spring, the bird on the roof,
resting one’s feet on a fine leather pouf
Of the scratch of an itch, a leaf on a tree,
the plop of a pebble thrown into the sea
Of the smooth from the rough, of the shape of the fluff
To be formed in the navel, oh you know the stuff
Of the ooh and an ahh, of the near and the far
Of the doobie doowap and sha la la la
Of the I and the we, of the you and the me
For to laugh is to laugh and to be is to be
And to laugh is to love and to love is for free
And to love is to know and to know is to see
And to see is to share and to share is to know
that creation of joy is to go with the flow
And the flow is to care and to care is to show
And to show is to harvest the love that we know
For these are the sheets of the freshly made bed
They are the scent of a new baby’s head
The pressing of snooze for the thirteenth time
that turns the mundane to the truly sublime
We must open our eyes to smallest of pleasures,
gather them up and then put them together,
and watch as they turn into health and to wealth
For they are the seeds of happiness itself
So we forked out for the giant family tipi and even got a bell tent for the nanny who immediately goes out and gets wasted on laughing gas
She comes back at four and just lolls around for the rest of the day like a junky
Phillip was absolutely livid:
‘I’ve got five children in private education, I work like a dog all year and all I wanted was to see Sugar-man and she can’t even change a fucking nappy!’
Of course he can’t sack her because her father’s Phillip’s biggest investor
All he could do was threaten to take her Mini away and not take her skiing this year
I said: ‘Phillip, you know you could retire tomorrow and have Sugar-man play in the barn, darling’
Phillip burst into tears and said: ‘Don’t you fucking understand, darling? I love my stupid fucking job
All I wanted to do was see fucking Sugar-man’
A moustache, what does it mean?
A personal statement to prune and to clip
A curious growth on a chap’s upper lip
Dashing or fiendish, professional, gay
Indeed we can read what a tash has to say
With a glance at the face and a view to the role,
a tash is a window right into the soul
Subversively worn by the mauve intellectual,
a badge of the biker and butch homosexual
Historically grown by the gayest Hussar,
Mexican bandit and Swedish porn star
A thistly bristle to pucker the mistle
or flyaway thing of the fluffiest fluff
Taken with snuff
Worn in the buff
Mate to the beard
Friend to the muff
Infusing the face with a masculine air
In filling a gap when a chap’s lost his hair
Imperial, lampshade, toothbrush, Sanchez
’Neath bowler or beret or turban or fez
The Christian, the Muslim, the Hindu, the Jew
Yes, a man’s got to do what a man’s got to do
Even agnostics and gnostics agree
that it’s healthy to cultivate topiary
Sprouting with vigour o’er grimace and pout
with weight to the boat race and nip to the snout
Proving that all men are all really the same
and the men with moustaches ain’t really to blame
Moustaches, tushtaches, histaches, yourtaches,
ourtaches, theirtaches, moretaches pleasetaches!
So let’s cast off the past of moustachio shame
and proclaim our aim
to unskew the frame
and relight the flame
and jump on the train
to reclaim the humble moustache from:
serial killers, bent coppers,
rogue hairdressers,
pimps, second-hand car salesmen,
malevolent public servants,
despots and dictators,
suspect window cleaners
that for so long have given the tash
such a terrible name
It was just another night at the seaside
The tide had come in and the sun had gone down
The shutters were up, the blank day had been drowned
There was flickering light from the pier’s sad remains,
a charred and smoking skeletal monument
hissing salute to the arsonist’s flame
And the youth were about their youthful business
of tranquillized vandalism, temazepam, sex,
some on the brown going down on the ground,
drowning with joy in a fluidless vortex
of casual car theft and chemical stargazing
The youth, I would say, were just doing their job
Some would call it low art, others plainly degrading
For it was just another night at the seaside
Just another shrill moped on the prom prom prom
Just another chilled posse of corned-beef-legged girls
begging for action – and it all smelled so strong
For it was just another night at the seaside
Where is my leopard-skin stretch limousine?
Where is the stuff of my star-studded dream?
Where is my villa in the south of France?
Where are all those sexy girls who meet me just by chance?
Where is the Arab steed I ride across the beach?
Where are the keys to my Bentley Corniche?
Where are the parties by the giant-sized pool?
Where are all my new-found friends who tell me I’m
just so cool?
Where are the charities knocking at the door?
Where are the Dobermans to keep away the poor?
Where is my castle in Beverly Hills?
Where is my drawer full of purple sleeping pills?
Where is my bitter and twisted biographer?
Where are the bushes containing photographers?
Where is the stalker who lurks in the park?
Where is my fear of being left in the dark?
Where’s my gerbil?
Where’s my hamster?
Where’s my guru?
Where’s my mantra?
Where’s my neurosis?
Where’s my psychosis?
Where is my strange and dysfunctional child?
Tiny, towering purple star
Leader legend, poet lover
Left us wondering what you are
Symbol, sequence, seer, other
Rock, funk, psych, jazz blues and soul
Cold seducer, Cuban heel
Staring down the Prince-sized hole
Twinkle-toed and hyperreal
Motorcycle black narcissus
Funny, fast and ready rude
Lipstick, winking, blowing kisses
Hot thing, sexed-up, horny, crude
Mad fret-magician, troubadour
Multi-instrumentalist
Talent stacked from skin to core
Falsetto existentialist
Whimsical and technical
In mastery of do and dare
Lyrical, theatrical
Axe-man par extraordinaire
Slave and frenzied feedback wizard
Energetic furnace feeder
Boudoir stalker, lounging lizard
Badass balladeer, band leader
Bullet gone in trauma taken
Pulled back to the hallowed soil
Icon, prophet, now we waken
Snatched up off the earthly coil
Your path across the mortal plain
As lightning rod and bolt as one
Your top-line and your groove remains
Your voice a princely smoking gun
It’s just too soon to say goodbye
Forgive us if we wait a while
to hear your six string growl and cry
back down along that purple mile
Please listen very carefully,
for taken hypothetically,
supported comprehensively,
basically, originally,
a single singularity
exploded quite impressively,
expanded exponentially,
creating stars and galaxies
with what must be quite logically
and coolly cosmologically
the building blocks of you and me
and continents and land and sea
A process evolutionary
through dinosaur hegemony
into our human ancestry
to cultural diversity
A growing global family
producing universities,
facilities, laboratories
Religion met the sciences
where people made discoveries
of fundamental articles
and elementary particles,
both magical and technical
and also mathematical
and random and symmetrical,
chemical and classical,
explained the metaphysical
that all things were divisible
But there must be a particle
much smaller than a neutron ball,
when answering the Hadron call
will finally inform us all
that we are one and we are all
That we are great and we are small
We are day and we are night
We are dark and we are light
I am he
As you are he
As you are me
As we are now and never
I am the mammoth
I am the dodo
I am the narwhal
Boo boo be doo!
Sleep, little Elvis mouse
Sleep, little Elvis mouse
and lay your tiny quiff
upon your silver spangled pillow
Tell us the dreams of stardust’s whiff:
countless mini hamburgers
and doctors by the score
and semi-naked cheerleaders
all knocking on your door
with peanut butter sandwiches
They comb it through with Brilliantine,
from white to black they dye your hair
You shake it like a Harlem queen,
shake it like a Harlem queen
Dance, little Elvis mouse
and climb the greasy pole
Look into the distorted mirrors
sent to steal your mousy soul
But no, little Elvis mouse
No, little Elvis mouse
No, you must not fear
the naughty little Lennon mouse,
the mocking Moon, McCartney mouse,
the little Mick and Keefy mice,
for they, it seems, will soon be here
They come not to blow down your house
nor wreck your cage nor steal your spouse
For pop will pop and never stop
Your quiff begets the mousy mop-top
Strop not, wee pop king, drop off
Back to sleep, little Elvis mouse
Sleep, little Elvis mouse
A prisoner of such wicked themes
Yet we will guard your (tiny) blue suede shoes
and not disturb your Elvis dreams
Well,
it’s dark and moody, very distinctive,
simple in texture with an anthemic tinge,
symphonically progressive, thoroughly impressive,
alternative mainstream with a synth rock twinge
It’s kinda Beck meets Bush meets Geggy Tah,
sorta Pulp meets Hole meets Verve meets Gwar
Think of ethereal Christian surf-goth blended with
psychedelic lesbian swamp rock
Half-pop, half-punk, half-deathcore
It’s kinda Vegas Britpop, but much, much more
Much, much more
Yeah, it’s a solo project
’Twas Britain and the slithy Gove
did gyre and gimble with the May
All mimsy was the Bozzagrove
and Corbyn raithes laid graves
‘Beware the Brexit beast, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Farage bird and shun
the frumious Junckersnatch!’
He took his Merkel sword in hand
Long time the manxome foe he sought,
and found the referendum tree
and stood a while in thought
And, as in uffish mood he stood,
the Brexit beast, with eyes of flame,
came whiffling through the UKIP woods
and burbled as it came!
Forty-eight! Fifty-two! And through and through
his Merkel blade went snicker-snack!
And in his head he thought it dead
and went galumphing back
‘And hast thou slain the Brexit beast?
Look to the polls, my squeamish boy!
Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Calais!’
He chortled in his joy
’Twas Britain and the slithy Gove
did gyre and gimble with the May
All mimsy was the Bozzagrove
and the Corbyn raithes laid graves
We’re watching now and listening too
Yet it was you that asked us to
when all was fresh and all was new,
and we arrived as clunky chunks
of dial-up modem hunks of junk
Behind the speak of geeky punks
we slowly first, then faster still,
like sugar fed the rising thrill
and rode the commerce-driven will
of boundless possibilities
as cyber revolutionaries
We marched out of the 1990s
through the noughties to the teens
with thinner, flatter, sharper screens,
with GPS and data streams
The future is just what it seems,
reality from cyber dreams
Oh, how it glints and how it gleams
And now we reach the shimmering ball
where cookies cling to one and all
Where algorithmic robots crawl
and graze upon the cyber plains
of sound bite-seeking wiki brains
And every swipe and click explains
that you no longer even fear
the thing you built to bring you here
The world as soon it will appear
The contract done, the deal in place
So soon it shall reveal its face
Man-machine, a hybrid race
No need to watch and listen to,
because we live inside of you
Only because you asked us to
A is for Adolph, who likes to be caned
B for Bathsheba, so often restrained
C for Christina, her senses deprived
D is for Dorkus, more dead than alive
E is for Elspeth, a whip in her hand
F is for Fergus on whom the blow lands
G is for Gertrude, who chews on a gag
H is for Harry, gone blue in a bag
I is for Indigo, stung by a bee
J is for Jocelyn, down on her knees
K is for Kevin, attacked by a gang
L for Lorenzo, who failed his exam
M is for Maurice, perusing a cat
N is for Nelly, who chases the fat
O is for Orson, the owner of slaves
P is for Peregrine, powdered and shaved
Q is for Quentin, a monk in a hood
R is for Reyna, who tries to be good
S is for Sally, who fisted for fun
T is for Tessa, who Quentin made numb
U is for Umbert, beneath golden rain
V is for Violet, both tortured and trained
W is for William, kept in a box
X is for Xavier in rubber socks
Y is for Yackob, whose guilt has been proved
Z is for Zelda, so rarely amused
As weather blows north and east,
oh quite unfit for man or beast,
come voices in the darkest night
with talk of summer sun and light
Strange voices bring us stranger news
of stalwart men both strong and true,
pitching sinew, guile and nerve
upon the Antipodeans’ Earth
(Across the snow and icy blast
we wonder what will come to pass)
Will Finn last the pace?
Will Monty appear?
Will Colly and Pietersen step up a gear?
Will Swanny return as the Sultan of Spin?
Will Bell carry on?
Will Anderson swing?
Will Broad keep his head?
Will Ponting prevail?
The ebb and the flow and the twist in the tale
Will Blowers and Viccas,
and Boycas and Ashers,
and Jenkers and Hughers,
and Tuffers and Aggers
deliver the game with a spring in their stride?
Report on the Yorker the duck and the wide?
The sweeping and cutting
and cheering and booing
The prodding and padding,
appealing, reviewing?
The pulling and pitching
and bouncing and lifting
The buffing and spinning
and flighting and drifting?
The slogging and lofting
and swinging and wafting
The poking and skewing
and spilling and ruing
To troops in the desert, for sailors at sea
To lovers of cricket, wherever they be
Of the green and the blue
Of the heat and the fight
Of the crack of the willow,
the leather in flight
The nip and the tuck
and the sting and the burn
Of the eyes on the prize
Of a hand on the urn
Of the roar of the crowd
and the quest for the best
Tea, cake, toast and the Test
So relax, you’re at home
And it is TMS!