Friday 27 August 2010

CHUNG’S CHINESE TAKEAWAY

Outside Chung’s Chinese Takeaway, stands a nutter, To utter at passers-by, ‘Chinese take away what?’
Ignored by most, the madman’s post is tolerated by Mr. Chung,
The proprietor with one lung.
Chung’s wheezes sound like breezes,
He donates a percentage of his profits to charities supporting asthmatics.
Pneumatic drills fill the air with their relentless noise
Outside the takeaway one day,
Making the madman cover his ears with his hands,
Trembling, sweating, he worries about his glands.
Are they letting him down?
He sees Mr. Chung as an Oriental clown.
At the back of the takeaway’s premises,
Boxes of fortune cookies foretell everything under the sun.
Chinese characters, displayed on banners above the counter, form an Asian pun.
Slightly erudite punters,
Interested in Cantonese and calligraphy,
Hazard guesses at the banner’s meaning,
And this impresses Mr. Chung.
Eric Cantona’s knees in Cantonese,
Another linguistic tease for Chung’s poser-punters-hunters—
Constantly seeking a cultural image to veil their shallowness.
A shallow Loch Ness would end speculation about its legendary monster,
Not that Chung cares for that, or any other urban myth.
As a lifelong celibate bachelor, a stranger to the lovers’ tiff,
Never is he lonely, he keeps too busy for that,
Yet sometimes he wonders all the same,
If the grass would be greener with a partner
He could fornicate with and blame.
Now, in his sixties, Chung recalls the ’60s,
And, distortedly, his youth,
His vision is impaired by sentiment,
His faulty memory is the result of decayed synapses,
Presenting symptoms of the onset of Alzheimer’s.
The nutter adopts a silent approach,
Presenting his repetitive query printed on a sandwich board.
Chung’s customers congratulate him on his clever advertising campaign,
He smiles his acknowledgement because he is polite, not vain.
Out in the kitchen, Chung sets fire to himself with his degenerating brain.
At last, the madman gets the answer he’s been awaiting for so long,
As Chinese undertakers take Chung away in a coffin.



Saturday 21 August 2010

THE STRIKE-BREAKING HAEMOPHILIAC

As haemophiliacs at their drop-in centre wondered why they bled,
Taking industrial action filled one haemophiliac with dread.
He was the first to break the strike he pretended he’d led—
To ingratiate himself with his workmates who wished that he was dead.
As he crossed the picket line, cries of, ‘Scab! Scab!’ were heard,
Which struck him as ironic, but not when it occurred.
It struck him as iconic—being struck by an effigy of a celebrity.
When he began to bleed, he knew he should go with the flow.
Leaving, he observed further irony amidst shouts of, ‘Go, clot, go!’

Sunday 8 August 2010

PICCADILLY

Don’t pick a ninny in Piccadilly to taste piccalilli,
For that would be silly.
As silly as picking knitters to nit pick at a picnic with,
Being too busy knitting jumpers to knit their brows having rows,
They’d hamper the picnic.
Pickpockets nick property; pedants pick holes in things,
Holes in your pockets will sock it to a pickpocket—
Who fleeing, empty-handed, wonders if pedants picked the holes in Swiss cheeses.
In Arctic breezes, a pickpocket freezes,
Wondering whether Gruyere is a Swiss cheese or an Australian feminist.