Meghan Queen of Plots
By PAT PRENTICE
This is a story of
Grossness not beauty
This is a tussle of
Fame versus Duty
Symbol of nation
Showbiz institution
Hollywood versus
The Brit Constitution
A D-listed actress
Whose aims were a mystery
Plotted to usurp
Aeons of history
She didn't scheme long
Thanks to rudeness it's said
At least unlike Mary
She left with her head
The US has fawners
Celebrity tapes
The English have castles
Dark nights and cold drapes
We don't go for Oprahs
We're a little more drab
But behind the show's light
Beware of the stab
The truth is you see
That to retain the Crown
We'll keep any old monarch
Factotum or clown
They're there to
control
Politicians and power
To ensure the votes
Stay in charge of the shower
So begone whingeing losers
Archie's crocodile tear
Count out your money
The Realm doesn't care
When the petulance fades
And the stars lose their bling
The State will still sing out
God Save the King
© Pat Prentice
The Floosie From La La Land
She came from the land of make-believe
With D-list briefs and a trick up her sleeve
While fame's lights glared she had it planned
To catch a prince and hold his gland
She got it all with a colourful twerk
But then found out that she had to work
Instead of a throne in a fairy tale
A full time job felt a lot like jail
So they fled and lied with a second-rate script
From a dumb conquest but then they tripped
They posed in the blaze and whinged victim
But their PR was flawed and their dazzle grew dim
Abandoning duty they joined the trash
In the sea of lures and sharks and cash
The cancel culture and bigoted woke
In the realm of tanned unsavoury folk
Now their dignity drains and they're not so grand
A fool and his floosie in La La Land
Winston's Rats
A gagged silent yard where it's always dark
The lights are out and the dogs can't bark
Ideas look behind themselves in fear
In case the thought police are near
Lavatory walls stare blank and wet
Their scrawls have dripped to the internet
Big Brother's rats scuttle in the street
Where tolerance and freedom meet
Bleak bricks cage the muted lane
While sympathy and reason wane
Assassins stalk words we hold dear
What you most dread is already here
Scampton Stamped On
I am a dog that dare not speak its name
I was once loved by men of great acclaim
Dead for free speech along the hall of fame
Where fighting Nazis did not augur blame
But there is another culture now
Reflecting Hitler, Stalin, George Orwell and Mao
Where righting wrongs means doing something tame
Like making sure dead pets don't have a name
Changing words and meanings is so lame
A beloved pet no longer has a name
When language alters, nothing stays the same
Censor the facts and where is freedom's flame?
It sinks in history's foulest stinking bog
From which will crawl an even darker dog
Beware what is the new repute of Scampton
A place where heritage is being stamped on
Where a slur of the Yankee nation
Flies in cultural appropriation
If Guy Gibson's life could now be fothered
He'd wake in shame and wonder why he bothered
© Pat Prentice
* A warning for war criminals who have been found out
Miranda
Tread softly dear Miranda
When you walk among the people You think they only watch the porch But they also see the steeple Remember dear Miranda
Your partner Mandy too
Your plans that were so plausible
You believed you'd see them through You soared so high Miranda Unleashed black bats in the air
But the wraiths will come to get you They're climbing the belfry stair
Why did you do it Miranda?
Afghans, Iraqis, Kosovans too
They're cold but your effigy's burning The crypt of history waits for you
© Pat Prentice
Hit-and-Run Hedgehog
I want to be a hit-and-run hedgehog
Squishing traffic in the dawn fog
I want to cross the motorway
Take my time. Amble all day
I want to be found in the morning
Safe and whole. Not squashed and swarming
I want to write off artic lorries
Then run off. Road-kill no worries
I want a pen pal in Australia
Roo-bar Joey. Killer, aintcha?
I want to get revenge for toads
Denting cars as they cross roads
I want to live in Lincolnshire
Puncture tyres and remain there
Not clay-roasted by a Pikey
I want to grunt, munch. And stay spiky
I want to crash through garden fences
Despoil all the lawn's defences
I want to evade nature's cadgers
Beat up foxes. Strangle badgers
So life is good and I feel great
Then I can safely hibernate
© Pat Prentice
* Some time ago, my daughter asked what retirement was like after nearly 50 years of journalism:
The Man Who Moves Mirrors
The man who moves mirrors glides across the floor.
But they take out his voice as he leaves by the door. The man who moves mirrors flew by the wires.
Now they're turned off they've put out the fires.
He witnessed, reported, the world from its heart.
Now he stays silent, unknown from the start.
He chased and he watched them year after year. Chronicled war crimes and lickspittle Blair.
Vile deeds in Westminster. Blowback Whitehall.
Tel Aviv, Langley, Press baron’s call.
Followed the light like a moth in a wood.
Flagged it for all in hope of the good.
Young men who marched off, brave and too few.
Killing for them while they betrayed you.
Demonised leaders, illegal invasions. Whitewash inquiry. Official evasions.
He knew all the secrets. Who lost and who won.
He knows who sired the leader's last son.
The M&M sweeties. He counted the aces.
Saw crooked arms twist submitted court cases.
He monitored royals. Was there when she died. Paternity highlights. Heir cut and dried.
Who armed al-Qaeda in Yugoslav war.
Who nursed Srebrenica. What big lies are for. Tirana-cashed cheques. As quiet as a mouse.
Lucre-stained organs. The Yellow House.
Corporate dealings, the thief and the leech.
Censors, injunctions, phobic free speech.
Upset them in China. Passed Russian doms. Smelled burning babies. American bombs.
Aid convoys to Africa, food for the rich.
Bloated black children dead in the ditch.
Saw the toffs quaff while their boys died abroad.
And they opened doors for the alien horde.
Duplicitous delegates cheating the vote.
State decreed angles that don't rock the boat.
The PRs, the decoys, spin doctors distract.
With BBC, TV, or fake online fact.
The man who moves mirrors, cynical hack.
Whose mission was catching and throwing life back. A butcher adrift in a sea of pork pies.
Seasoned with slang. Are you watching who buys?
A vintner of verities dead on the vines.
Hooks to swallow, live bait between lines.
The mirrors he tilts and distortions he stalls.
Bending, refracting, dark shapes on the walls.
The door closes softly.
Stealth mute he will leave.
No point in telling.
The fools won't believe.
© Pat Prentice
* I used to catch the train to Charing Cross and wonder how the denizens of cardboard city had arrived there. There was even a dark side to Fleet Street. Some people fell by the drayside
The Roaring Days
I hardly acknowledge the roaring days
In my world of cold struggle and looking for drays
The babble and chaos and smoke in the lung
As I shuffle through camp ash and unfragrant dung
The afternoons dashing and fighting for balls
The mud on my muscles. The spit and the falls
Running and crashing. The heel of the hand
And shouting and scoring. The front of the band
Soap in the showers, the rub-a-dub-dub
The songs and the triumphs and first in the pub
Glasses and strong arm and jostle and barge
Beer race and spewing and shoulder to charge
Somewhere a new wife; the rim of the crowd
A blur on the edge. Indiscretions out loud
The hangover Mondays then Tuesdays and all
Hard selling and chasing the charts on the wall
Good years come harder; the mortgage, the house
Suddenly young men, much quicker, with nous
Late nights and shambling, too much to think
Too late for home life. Plunge over the brink
Wet Wednesday evening draught door left ajar
Enraged in the morning. The bailiffs. The car
Photo on telly; a young man and bride
Nothing to lose now. No pride
The charger you ride has no rattle or clink
To mumble and tussle in hunt for a drink
Pale looks of friends at the end of the day
The glow of the bar; turn their faces away
Ricochet off to a cold empty cell
Lavatory broken; the pit for a spell
No reason to get up. No sleeping; no bell
Building society can go to hell
Dog shit on flagstones. Darkness and wind
Smelly chip wrappers that mock, like you've sinned
Dirty car tyres, blue fumes and more throttle
Rotting ripe bins for the end of a bottle
Filthy old raincoat; stale sandwich; a toss
Coin, cardboard box behind Charing Cross
Flashback of giggles, blonde curls and blue eyes
She won't be there sobbing when her Daddy dies
Frost; fingerless gloves; raw ends of days
Fat vicars who lecture and Sally Ann ways
Documentary lights come and glare Christmas night
The stink and the piss; the brown stains and blight
Waiting now; twitching, and shouts in the sleep
The rats that screech out, and pop up. And weep
As I grab and bellow; fall over and need
Kicked by the coppers; sod them, and bleed
Rain and black thunder just down from Bank
Feet scuttle; home time. Like sheep but more swank
Then come back tomorrow; greed, rabble, and low
Half bottle of meths cider-mixed in the snow
Jabber and slobber and dribble and vile
Soot stains and sputum and hacking out bile
Clenching red entrails; black toes out of shoes
Finger-torn flesh in a fight for the booze
Pigeon lime licked off the back of a hand
Gobbed at and shoved and shunned in The Strand
Off now. I'll kill them. The braggarts, the brays
Back for good. Strong. The roaring old days
Lurching and retching and hitting the wall
Fuck them; I know them; I conquered them all
Bruised on the Masonry
I still have friends
Here
I have secrets
It ends
Graduation Day
High above East Anglia
In Norwich football ground
A seagull soared above us
Without making a sound
Beneath was noise and bugles
Berobed in hat and gown
Professors plump and certain
Students' fake renown
In batches called to honour
Receiving their degree
That cost a little fortune
Mass knowledge isn't free
Then out to life and hope to earn
A wage above the rest
Except it will not any more
Honours have failed the test
False promises and doctrines
Will fail to cut the mustard
Out in the proper market place
You don't season with custard
Strutting, posing, marionettes
The young can call them heroes
The main lecture that they pursued
Was how to ban sombreros
Puffed chests of the faculty
Proud parents looking on
Fat pay for mediocrity
An academic con
Yet high above the UEA
The circling seagull flies
Ignoring dons and masters
And their thieving lies
Did uni teach it how to glide?
A clever master's caper?
The seagull rose above them all
With nothing writ on paper