While sailors open drums of rum
To swig below the decks
Indulgent captains who succumb
Are often found in wrecks
Nauti Buoys
Category: history
Branch Locator
Without any apology
I traced my genealogy
In hope I’d find an entry
Replete with well-heeled gentry.
Perhaps a Duke without an heir
Yet to bequeath his titled lair
Or better yet a Duchess
Who’d keep me in her clutches.
I dreamed of billionaire tycoons
Who sipped and supped from silver spoons
Whose present state of wealth
Fared better than their health.
But no! I learned my great-great-gran
Was jailed because she shot a man
Who wooed her in a heath
Then ran off with her teeth.
Another ancestor trained bears
To ride on bikes and dance on chairs
Until they grew to hate him
I guess that’s why they ate him.
Much further back, one of our crowd
Could summon rain down from a cloud
But locals weren’t that smitten
Because they lived in Britain.
If you’ve swung through my family tree
Please have the cheque made out to me
Because this brachiator
Wants paying now, not later.
Constellation Prize
The figure on the mountain knew
Far higher than the eagle flew
Beyond the sun and past the light
Were men who crossed the sky by night.
Soon after dusk their fires appeared
Then slowly, once a course was steered
Their caravan set out en masse
To make its empyreal pass.
Like beasts migrating on the plains
Like swarms that form to greet the rains
He found no word for the amount
Of travelers he sought to count.
A gallery would pass him by
Whose outlines seemed to signify
Proud emblems of a noble clan
Led by an even a greater man.
The bearing, always east to west
Suggested they were on a quest
Or maybe searching for a door
They’d passed through in a time before.
Each night the figure danced and prayed
Around the fire he had made
In hope his kin might see its glow
And teach him all he wished to know.
Then with the last beat from his breast
Great Spirit granted this request
And drew his outline in the sky
That men as he should never die
Prickly Heat
My love is like a red red rose…
One Scottish bard chose to expose.
My ex was like a Yucca plant
And on the yeuch I’m adamant.
Arch Nemesis
Beware the Ides! foretells the fall
Of he who rose to conquer Gaul
And lands still further from his home
This warrior, this son of Rome.
On his return to claim his right
A haruspex with second sight
Met Caesar by the Senate arch
To warn him of the Ides of March.
They’d killed an ox and found no spleen
An omen that could only mean
The Consul should fear for his life
As did, Calpurnia, his wife.
But Caesar didn’t fear the gods
For he had overcome the odds
To overshadow mortal men
And take his seat in Rome again.
So came the day, but nothing passed
Until the Senators amassed
Fulfilling what was prophesied
Thus, on the fifteenth, Caesar died.
Of every haruspex, it’s said
They earn their living from the dead
And though they claim the role of seer
It’s often what we overhear
Double Cross
But somewhere, somehow Judas turned
And walked away from all he’d learned
So, when the two men dipped their bread
They both knew one would soon be dead.
We’re not sure how it came to this
Why he betrayed him with a kiss
To bring about the earthly end
Of someone he had called a friend.
Arrested, tortured, hung to die
While soldiers laughed and women cried
His friend collected his reward
And hoped the cause had been restored.
But this betrayal had a price
Which cost poor Judas paradise
He lost his friends then lost all hope
And wound up swinging from a rope.
Where is he now? God only knows
Good people pray for his repose
In hope our own friends keep us close
At those times when we need them most
Seasoned Greetings
When greeting guests in Tokyo
The custom is to bow down low
While in Tibet both old and young
Say hi by sticking out their tongue.
In France it’s chic to peck the cheek
And friends will clap in Mozambique
Though Greenlanders will sniff your face
Before they help you with your case.
Most Eskimos rub nose to nose
In India they touch your toes
And Zambians will squeeze the thumbs
Of visitors considered chums.
Through handshakes, winks and nods we say:
I’m pleased that you dropped by today!
And bless those friends who always know
The sign for when it’s time to go…
If It Ain’t Baroque…
Nudism in cubism
Falls under The Abstract
And artist folk behind each stroke
Admit it’s inexact.
The avant garde can leave some jarred
So, should you choose to pose
Don’t be surprised to find your eyes
Where most look for their toes.
Face Booked
Said Narcissus’s missus:
No kiss is as his is…
Knight Shift
Take me to that fabled time
When destiny was more sublime
When noble quests were blessed by God Himself
Where crones intoned prophetic rhymes
While wizards read the stars for signs
And deep within each hollow hid an elf.
Take me to a time before
When magic could unlock a door
And conjurers cried out Abracadabra!
Where every frog tried to convince
Young maidens he might be a prince
And sonnets were composed by candelabra.
To play a brazen game with Death
One leap beyond the dragon’s breath
Dispatching ogres twice the height of men
And then, to lay beneath a tree
While my sweet Lady sings to me
For as she does, my soul’s restored again.
Take me to that fabled time
The course now clear
No more to roam
Astraeus, chart the stars for home
Mr Ormsby At Large 