198. A Bee in My Bonnet!

Some of you will understand  this poem! If you do, don't give your age away!

A BEE IN MY BONNET!

Do you recall the Beehive? No, not the one with bees?

But the 1960s hair-do, requiring a lot of 'tease'!

My hair was always whispy and body-less and fine,

But Beehives were the fashion so, of course, I made it mine!

But the struggle and the anguish simply can't be overstated!

The visits to the salon which were frequent and much-hated;

The sitting in the chair as pretty hairdressers tut-tutted,

And their remarks, so critical, which made me feel quite gutted.

'If Modom had more hair' they'd say, 'We'd be able to produce

Something elegant and smart, but, in your case, what's the use?'

'I must look like my friends!' I'd cry 'A poor workman blames his tools!

Modom wants a Beehive! Supply it! Them's the rules!

The customer is always right! So go ahead! Beehive me!

Be creative! Something grand is what you must contrive me!'

And so they duly went ahead, with shampoo, and with rinse,

And a lot of other 'condiments' I haven't noticed since!

Once washed, my little bit of hair lay limply on my head,

Until the wretched rollers made it wide and high instead.

Then came the awful dryer, and a scalp all burning hot,

But a Beehive would be my reward so I didn't mind a jot.

Back-combing! Is it done these days? It's a wonder we survived it!

But hair demanded torture as the hairdresser Beehived it!

The hair was, first, teased one way, and then, as Modom cursed,

The whole revolting process was immediately reversed.

Now all the in-between hair was tangled, knotted, matted,

And the net-result was Modom looking very woolly-hatted!

Now the clever part! A few stray strands, left longer and still pliable,

Were spread out over all the mess and made to look reliable.

Indeed, when it was smoothed and glossed, it really looked a treat,

Like some enormous hairy egg, quite good enough to eat.

Now for the spray and do not think I'm talking of a puff.

Great streams of it for evermore it seemed were not enough!

At last came the displaying, with triumphant shouts of glee,

And the most excited person there was Beehived little me!

I was modern, I was 'with it',( though we didn't use that phrase.)

I paid the pretty hairdresser and heaped great songs of praise.

I peered then, at the outside world, was it a little wet?

If so, I'd need the plastic bonnet one dared not forget!

I'd hurry home before the nasty elements could play

Fast and loose with my great hair, and ruin my whole day.

There followed then a week of care, of lying stiff in bed,

Making sure that nothing spoilt the glory on my head!

( I didn't need a 'headache', my hair had other uses;

I didn't need to parrot any other old excuses!)

Of course, I didn't wash it! Just the lightest surface brush,

And a patting into place of all the bits that I might crush.

But, inevitably, bits began to flop and droop and sag!

By the ending of the week I was a hide-in-the-cupboard hag!

Come Saturday I'd have to go through all the whole routine,

So that I could strut about as the local Beehive Queen!

Was ever there a torture so designed to lay us low?

Did everybody suffer as I did I want to know!

My hair today is flat and fine, and 'doing its own thing'.

It doesn't mind a rainy day or the breezes battering.

I'm so delighted it's no more, that silly fashion craze!

Whoever coined lying words and said

THE GOOD OLD DAYS?

197. A Strange Illusion

ESCHER

Written for SUNDAY SCRIBBLINGS, the topic of which is 

STRANGER.

Well, I can't think of a much stranger world than the one depicted!

A STRANGE ILLUSION!

Stranger than fiction! 

Here we see a picture that amazes!

Stairs going up, then going down, 

All ending up in mazes.

A man is walking underneath 

A flight of stairs. it seems,

And doors, all sideways, lead outside,

Where we feel there should be beams!

A man walks up towards a door 

That's tilted on its side,

And I see dark corners where grey men

Can scuttle in and hide.

These faceless creatures move about

Like an hallucination;

Are they going up or down?

Where is their destination?

A man sits on an upright wall,

But he doesn't lose his balance!

It's clear to see these faceless men 

Have never-ending talents!

This is the stuff of nightmares

I feel that I'm delirious!

It's just the oddness of it all

That sense of the mysterious.

We humans like things as they are,

We don't much care for change,

And down as up and up as down

Makes us feel distinctly strange.

Looking at this picture

Makes me feel quite odd and queasy,

Out of sorts, a little faint,

And terribly uneasy.

An optical illusion?

That gives a designation;

But it doesn't really quite explain

My physical sensation.

If I found myself in such a world

I'd feel in mortal danger!

To such a strange and dangerous place

I'd like to remain

A Stranger! 

Where were You?

WHERE WERE YOU WHEN.......?

I remember, I remember the time when he was born.

I know exactly where I was that day.

It wasn't a 'Kennedy' moment, or the ending of a War,

But the memory is vivid, in that way.

I was coming down the hill, the sun had set, the moon was high,

And the church bells were all ringing in my ears,

And I suddenly felt HISTORY; I was living on a stage;

This was my time, this was my year of years.

For all of us were Royalists, we worshipped our youthful Queen,

And this child was her first-born, a new Prince.

And I felt a surging joy, as though everything were right,

And I haven't felt like that a great deal since!

I whispered as I walked along 'A Prince! We have a Prince!'

It was fairy-story stuff, I see that now.

It all seemed so romantic; he'd be noble, strong and tall,

And before him every humble knee would bow!

Of course, his Daddy helped a bit! The Lover of my dreams,

That gorgeous Philip, married to our Queen,

I was really quite enamoured of that handsome, regal beast.

(And, don't forget that I was seventeen!)

So, now Prince Charles is sixty, and has lost much of his bloom,

And I'm a great deal older, sad to say,

I can still relive that moment of pure joy when he was born.

'Happy Birthday!'

That is all there is to say.

196.Jinxed!!

Not guilty! This joke existed in prose form before I ever got hold of it!

JINXED!

It was a touching moment.

The sick man lay in his bed.

His faithful wife

Who had shared his life,

Hovered near his head.

He looked up at her features

And then she heard him say

'You've been grand;

You've held my hand

Every step of the way.

When the house burnt down, you were there, dear.

You were there when I hurt my knee.

You were at my side

When my old dog died,

And when I fell out of that tree.

You were there when I lost my money,

You were there when I crashed my car;

When I looked around

You were always found!

What a faithful old girl you are!

Yes, now that I've caught a virus

You're hovering as before.

Never far away.

And every day

I see you come through the door.

Whenever I've been in trouble

Been foolish or run amok,

You've been involved.

Now the riddle's solved!

It's clear you bring Bad Luck!'

195. Tears.

I receive a magazine from a limited publication in the United Kingdom called 'The Evacuee', written by and for the British children who were evacuated from dangerous areas in World War Two. I was one of them.

One contribution in the latest issue was the following story. I thought it worth re-telling.

(The pilot is a model.)

TEARS

We celebrated the Armistice not very long ago;

The end of World War One which brought such suffering and woe.

And World War Two was added and some other wars beside,

And we mourned the poor young soldiers who so bravely fought and died.

'Our' men, 'our' soldiers, 'our' deceased were rightly celebrated.

But mine's a rather different take, and very much belated.
He was a German pilot, programmed to cause harm.

He was shot down by a Spitfire and he landed on a farm.

By a miracle he walked out of the wreckage of his plane,

Knowing he'd be captured but could live to fight again.

Then he saw his plane had landed on a farmer and his wife.

He was spared, but, in the crash, his plane had taken life.

Then, horror upon horrors, he saw a child was there!

Also dead! You'd think a German wouldn't even care!

You'd think he'd quickly run and hide, escaping while he could, 

Down in a ditch, or up a tree, or deep in a nearby wood.

For Germans, as we all were told, were nasty, murderous brutes,

Who strutted round intent on war in frightening Nazi boots.

How was it, then, that when they came to carry him away,

He was sobbing like a baby and everyone heard him say

'I've killed a child! I've killed a child! It's more than I can bear!'

And, for a moment, very moved, they left him weeping there.

Later, in the papers, expressing great surprise,

The headline said

 'Amazing! A German pilot cries!'

Yet it wasn't so amazing. It was one thing making war;

After all a lot of soldiers had been making it before.

Way up in the sky war was a story to be told

And Pilots were delighted to be seen as brave and bold.

But he saw a little body lying shattered by his side!

He was a human-being and a little child had died.

Our enemy? No, just a man and not ashamed to be

An ordinary example of our shared humanity.

194. Quokka Query

An ABC WEDNESDAY entry for letter 'Q'.




(A"Q" entry can also be seen on my PLUS blog.)

As told in this little verse, the quokkas of the island off the coast of Western Australia were first thought to be rats. Hence the name 'Rats' Nest' or Rottnest as the Dutch named it. Now it is a very popular holiday destination, with not a rat in sight. Just lots of quokkas still enjoying life.

The second photograph is one I took last year, on holiday. The child is unknown.

 QUOKKA QUERY

A quokka asked a question,

(As quokkas often do.)

'This name, Rottnest, is a mystery;

Tell me, is it true

That way, way back in history, 

When the Europeans came,

They thought that we were little rats

So coined that 'Rats' Nest' name?'

Spoke the ghost of Willem de Vlamingh,

'I fear that it is so.

When I landed on the West Coast

Three hundred years ago,

I saw the tiny wallabies

But didn't understand

That they were small marsupials,

Natives of this land.

They ran about among the trees

And seemed to beg for food.

But I must agree that 'Rottnest' name

Was really rather rude.'

Said the quokkas 'We forgive you.

For we're famous, anyhow!

And the name of Rottnest Island

Stands for happy holidays now.

People travel to our island

From everywhere on earth.

And the folk of Western Australia

Enjoy days-out from Perth.

And still we run like pretty rats

In and out the trees

As the humans laze on our beaches

And swim in our turquoise seas.'

193. Bracket Creeps

BRACKET CREEPS

Maude Edpot (91)

Kills her lover with a gun.

Brad Bustley (42)

Drowns in a vat of glue.

Merle Tichmans (63)

Swims the Mediterranean Sea.

Rita Redbull (44)

Intends to move to Baltimore.

Ted Finchset (55)

Eats furry caterpillars, live!

Rob Applerum (26)

Enjoys doing his magic tricks.

Mary Rifford (37)

Seen here on holiday in Devon.

Paul Pliggot (88)

Says he intends to hibernate.

Joe Hickham (69)

Daily drinks four bottles of wine!

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Why does the local press,

Not content with name and address,

Have to state the subject's age

Clearly, on every printed page?

If I'm knocked over by a bus

I'll loudly scream and shout and cuss.

I'll quiver with my pent-up rage

But I certainly wont declare my age!

I won't be shouting out 'Yippee!

I'm in great pain, and I'm 73!'

Any reporter, standing by,

(Hoping that I'm going to die!)

May utter softly under his breath

'Looks 82 and near to death.'

I'll sturdily rise up from the ground,

Face those on-lookers standing round

And I'll declare 'Forget my age!

I'll sue if I see it on your page!

Write, if it's all the same to you
'Brenda,
MENTALLY TWENTY-TWO!'

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