Sun Cream

The vital importance of sun cream
Is importance that I never learned,
And so, when I went to the seaside,
I got quite unpleasantly burned.

A Limerick About Sex And Violence

It wasn’t your cheek that I kissed.
I went for your cheek but I missed –
You tilted your head
So we touched lips instead
Then your boyfriend extended his fist.

My Hands

Don’t look at my hands.
My hands look all wrong.
They’re blotchy and weird
And the nails are too long.
And they got really burned
Back when I was a kid,
So my hands have aged more
Than the rest of me did.

Fad Diet

Ask me how I lost the weight.
It’s just a crazy diet.
I read it in a magazine
And thought that I should try it.
Apparently they learnt it from
Dogs and other species –
Instead of buying food from shops
You just re-eat your faeces.

It’s Valentine’s Day

It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s Valentine’s Day,
Everyone’s happy and flirty and frisky.
It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s Valentine’s Day,
I’m filling a trolley with bottles of whisky.
It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s Valentine’s Day,
A hoot and a holler and fun for both sexes.
It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s Valentine’s Day,
I’m drawing moustaches on pictures of exes.
It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s Valentine’s Day,
A time to show loving and fondness and caring.
It’s Valentine’s Day, it’s Valentine’s Day,
I’m drunk up a tree drinking brandy and swearing.

Minotaur

My mum’s a queen, my dad’s a bull,
My days and nights are mostly full
Morosely mooching round my maze,
My horned head hung in sad malaise.
My step-dad had this structure built
To keep me hidden, spare Mum’s guilt
At bringing him so much disgrace
And leading to my taurine face.
I eat the folks that come to visit,
But really that’s not my fault, is it?
It’s just there’s nothing else to eat,
Entrapped within a maze in Crete.

One Day

One day my writing will make someone cry,
In a positive way, not a bad one.
I’ll work really hard on the next rhyme I write
And I’ll make double sure it’s a sad one.
I’ll carefully choose all the words that I use
And the feelings the words’ll convey.
It won’t just be tragic and morbid and bleak,
But be sad in a beautiful way.

The Band That Changed The World

I remember that September,
I was seventeen and drunk.
Adulthood seemed a mile off,
I was getting into punk.
I had an old acoustic
And I’d learned some basic chords,
And was getting tips from strangers
On guitarists’ message boards.
We formed a band, The Toilets,
All convinced that we’d be stars.
Rehearsals weren’t too frequent
(We were getting into bars).
We could have been amazing,
It never quite transpired,
As when we weren’t all wasted
We were bleary-eyed and tired.
We worked hard on our image,
Though we didn’t play that well,
And tore a lot of clothing,
And spent too much on gel.
We thought that one day soonish
We’d get a massive deal,
And soon we’d all have mansions,
While still we’d keep it real.
We hadn’t any songs yet,
Just a logo and a name,
But knew that we’d be legends
So prepared ourselves for fame.
Months went by, and nothing.
We were slowly realising
That we had exams approaching
And were better off revising.
Our A-Levels arrived and went.
We’d all done fairly well.
I headed off to Glasgow,
Dave went to UCL.
Teddy had deferred a year
To go and do some travelling,
And Stu was bode for Cardiff.
I felt the band unravelling.
I took the plane to Scotland,
And as soon as I had landed,
I rang up all the others
And The Toilets were disbanded.
A good ten years have passed,
And we’re no longer seventeen,
Yet often I’ll still wonder what
The Toilets could have been.
Now we see each other rarely,
Though we still get on just fine.
I’m hoping for a comeback tour
In 2029.

Dodgy Icy Shortcut

Getting home faster
Would be very nice,
But the shortcut’s all dodgy
And covered with ice.
My bag’s full of comics;
I don’t think I’ll risk it –
NERD DIES IN ICE FALL
Would just take the biscuit.

Elvis Impersonator

A normal day inside the pub.
A man walked in the door.
Then suited up inside the loo
And Elvis took the floor.
The jumpsuit looked a little cheap,
His belt was unconvincing.
This looked a little awful.
A lot of us were wincing.
But then he started singing
And his voice was full of soul.
He was genuinely awesome
As the King of Rock’n'Roll.
It seems a little bleak though –
I’d rather fail as me
Than dazzle as a trucker’s son
From Memphis, Tennessee.