Announcement

‘State the fact,’ he tells the board; ‘announce mid-
morning without warning; too late then to
retaliate; say, “times change – so on-your-
way. Redundancy accompanies age.'"

Walks easy through his fortress-grounds of trip-
alarms and snarling hounds. Youthful bride is
safely sealed from vengeful pawn and bitter
foe, and waits, consoled by views of vale and
river's flow, gleaned through rail and safety-gates.

Mower idle on the lawn; barrow still
beside a wall; jobbing-boy holds toil in
scorn. ‘We'll propel the youth to manhood with
a jolt! He'll learn the bitter-truth of how
to cope without a job – or hope; collect
his due then face his fate as men must do.’

Holding high the diamond-ring, gift for the
girl with everything; to rent her love and
smile awhile; into the room where hi-fi
croons her favourite tune then … ‘Christ!’ Mind won't
focus with the eyes; wife on table, lips
apart, hair a-splay, radiant as her
wedding day; boy – a man between her thighs …


Charlie Gregory
Prifddinas
Cymru

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History Repeating Itself

There’s a brilliant one in this paper I’m reading. A woman in Oldbury, West Midlands, was smoking a cigarette at the bus stop when along comes a jobsworth warden and hands her a £75 fixed penalty for being a litterlout. She promptly takes an asthma attack, falls, and knocks herself out. She says the warden caused the asthma attack because he penalised her for smoking.
This reminds me of a letter a reader once sent me. I rehash here for your perusal.

Dear Charlie,
The government says that smoking can damage your health.
My Uncle Fred smoked a hundred a day for thirty years and it never did him any harm.
He was killed by a bus while having a coughing fit in the middle of the main road.
Nobody has said we should ban buses.

Taffy Twollop
Llwntyllwffydd
Abersilly

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I’ve made an executive decision.
I’m never going to die.
God will have to kill me.

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For all: -

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The Only Way Forward

For 12 jolly years, Honest Tony, then Good Gordon and Harry Har-thingy assured Joe Blow and me that, ‘Immigration is good for the economy.’ So Joe and I watched with puzzled frowns as ’ onest-T, then Good Gord and Happy ’ arry shipped in our economic saviours from all quarters of the globe.

But the moment that ’onest-T, Good Gord and thingy, rode off into the sunset, Foreign Foxes from the IMF came galloping in and told me and Joe that, in spite of all this outside help, ‘Your economy’s in shit-state mate. So you’d better pull your socks up and tighten your belts, or else your grandchildren will have to exist on handouts from the Congo and Zimbabwe.’

Now I don’t know about Joe, but I don’t want to pull up my socks and tighten my belt. But, at the same time, I don’t want my grandchildren to be a burden on Africa.

No. I prefer what Good Gord and ’onest-T told me, that the answer lies in mass immigration. So, after weighing up the pros and cons, and placing my faith in the sound advice of Honest Brits, instead of Foreign Fibbers, I think that we should scrap Border Control and sack everyone in it.

Then the world and his wife will swarm over the channel like Patton’s Cavalry riding to the rescue, and deliver us and our sick economy from the folly of our own greed.

After that, in the Utopia promised by Johnson and Prescott, with estates and ghettos stretching from coast to coast, and everyone fully employed building houses and roads and divining for drinking water, we will roll down our socks, loosen our belts, and scornfully tell the Africans to, ‘Stick your money up your jacksies!’

God Bless Us One and All

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Puck Fair
Killorglin, Co Kerry, Ireland

Where in August, on The Gathering day, the 12-year-old Puck Queen crowns a wild mountain goat, ‘King Puck.’ Then, as the Gaelic-tongued travelling people move into town with a thousand horses for the sales, the king is hauled to his pedestal above the town-square.

For three days now the streets are filled with music and dancers, entertainers and tumblers; bars open till three in the morning; air full of the wistfully beguiling lilt of the fiddle and pit-of-the-tummy-pulping beating of the bodhran.

Through it all, King Puck reigns over his subjects from a luxurious cage at the top of the 30-foot tower as, on day two, the horse sales give way to the cattle sales – and day three, The Scattering day, he is dethroned and the people depart. And this is:

                              The Goat's Tale

‘There's magic in the Coolroe-stream, or pucks
weave herb into the browse to make me dream ...

In Killorglin-town I bowed before a
virgin-queen, who gave a crown to make me
king with vision over everything. Our
match remained unconsummate, for I was
hailed on-high, engaged, though caged, in things of
state. There, phantoms clad in cap and boot, waved
crooked-sticks and mumbled-strange in ancient-
tongue – then bought and sold the living-soul of
sullen-ox and horse and colt. While, at my
feet, the men danced women down the street, like
spectres borne on haunting-notes of lonely
songs that sang of sorrows in the years – how
wanton-maids, with torment-eyes, as wild and
green as Lough Lean's isles, and ringlets wrought in
purest gold, like wavelets caught in sunset's
mould, were, by their beauty, thus condemned to
birthing-pain and living-drudge. While boys, like
bumble-bees, beguiled by nectar spilled by
girls, were led along a lane of toil and
grudge ...

                       Now I wake-up in the glen, running
free of 'Orglin-men, to gambol up the
giddy-scree into the cloud where Mother
Earth becomes the sky; and sense a life set
out for me, of butting he and tupping
she. Then see the visions of my dream; hear
the laughing of the stream; and wonder – why?’

Charlie Gregory
Puck Fair
Killorglin
County Kerry

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Joy Upon Joys

You’re not going to believe this: but I’m in the house the other day when there comes this high pitched scream of utter abandonment, followed by wave after wave of moaning ecstasy. ‘Uncle Fred’s got one of his porn videos on,’ I tell myself, galloping from room to see which tele or computer he’s gawping at; don’t want to miss a trick

But no; he’s nowhere to be seen. I scuttle round again, looking for feet protruding from under beds or behind settees. People do funny things in funny places – but no luck. And still the din continues; ever higher; ever more delirious; joy upon joys …

Then I find them – behind a curtain; a couple of hornets having a shag on the dining-room window.

Being a man of compassion I let them finish before I kill them.

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Russell Howard is a whining insipid Trotsky-brained wurzel-gobbling whelp who makes a fortune spewing out verbal defecation and daubing it over his elders and betters.

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Maybe It’s My Hormones

I’ve just done a trip on the motorway and it jogged my memory about the people I must add to my – List of Arseholes. This is on top of those who are already well and truly there, like:-
The lazy buggers who are too idle to flick their indicator switches when I’m trying to work out what their next surprise move will be.
And those others – the cross-eyed gets who park their cars on the footpath to leave more room for other vehicles on the road. ‘Sod pedestrians, wheelchairs, the blind and kids on bikes. We motorists must stick together.’
Hey! Blank-face! People on footpath! Cars on road! Ah – never mind. It’s too complicated.

Now come two more groups who had slipped my memory for a split second.
First up are the arse-licking creeps who crawl past speed cameras at 5 or 10 miles an hour slower than they need too. If you ever wondered what happened to the class sneak from school
– the one who always sat bolt upright, straight back, neck stretched, arms folded, ‘Please sir; it wasn’t me sir; I never done that sir, it was him sir, Gregory sir, not me sir, honest sir, I’m a good boy me sir.’ – well now you know.
It’s that bastard in front, the one who slammed his anchors on to creep past the camera.

Then there’s that other wild eyed group of animals who come shooting down the motorway at 80 or 90 miles an hour, inches away from the car in front. I’ve no sooner said to my beloved, ‘Look at those daft bastards,’ than I glance in the mirror and find there’s one in my boot, maniacal face staring over my shoulder.
If there was such a thing as reincarnation these prats would come back as dogs and spend eternity sniffing each other’s arses.

God Bless Us One and All

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Unknown Girl

Busy office mid the traffic roar. My
phone has shrilled a dozen times before. Now
a girl is crying down the line; keeps crying,
crying all the time. ‘Don't speak, just hear. I've
taken pills but feel no fear. I random-
dialled; need someone there; unseen confessor
for my prayer, a ghost to know the reason
why, at seventeen, I chose to die. When
mother went I was alone – though he was
there; so life and body not my own. I've
run away but no escape. He traces
me and then the rape. He gets a key and
wakes me in the dead of night. He beats me
when I say, “I'll tell,” or makes to mark me
with a knife. It's living hell; devalued
life. His friends, he says, fill every place – from
law to health and Women's Aid. I see a
spy in every face. I can't seek help; I'm
too afraid. My very soul must bear the
brand of his misuse, and yet I feel I've
no excuse. If God absolves me from all
blame – why do I feel this dreadful shame? It's
so unjust! My life's debased by this man's
lust. He won't have me anymore; just find
me lying on the floor ...’ Leaves me with an
empty line; crying, crying all the time.
Charlie Gregory
Samaritan Days

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