The Troll - Tony Gardner

Deep there in the darkness underneath the bridge
Sits a scary fella, hungry for a meal
And if you don't tip-toe circumspect across
He may hear and grab you tightly by the heel
If he thinks you're tasty, he'll eat you with his bread
If he thinks you're pretty he'll take you to his bed

Underneath the dark bridge hides the scary Troll
Just waiting for his meal to come along
So tip-toe as you pass him, across his scary bridge
And never, Never, NEVER sing a song
If he catches you, he’ll eat you, with salad for his Tea
If he likes you he will cage you where none will ever see.

Tony Gardner

S.O.S. (Save Our Statues) - Oscar Milde

Prince Albert with his pier-side view
and Hugo up on Candie’s rock
must tremble, if a stone statue
can tremble when it gets a shock
as, one by one, monuments fall.
If one’s pulled down, what next, them all?

It must be worrying to be
a statue, innocent or not:
the subject of such scrutiny,
regarded by some as a blot
to be reviled, to have to move
because campaigners disapprove.

Things change, we know that, nonetheless,
while change is good, some is less so.
Should we not focus on progress,
move on from wrongs of long ago,
together face a future shared
where threatened statues may be spared?

Oscar Milde

Operation Mincemeat - Stephen A. Roberts

Do you remember
The man who never was
An unnamed corpse
Turned volunteer for the cause

She met him on the subway
Sweetly they held hands
Before his final journey
To foreign lands

A considerate lover
A special friend
She imagined a different life
But it had to end

Floating in a foreign sea
He became alive
And by his dead embassy
Helped to fool the other side

Stephen A. Roberts

Image: Wikipedia

Track and Trace - Joan Etoile

I got a strange call from Track and Trace
Who said that I had been in some place
Where as far as they could reasonably tell
I'd brushed past someone with no sense of smell

I said that's lucky cos I usually whiff
Of creeping old age and a hint of Jif
I asked where and how, I pressed them too far
'Cos they decided to hide behind GDPR

"You'll need a test and will have to pay
Give us your bank details straight away"
Like Stroobs my ever-faithful cat
I began to smell a bloney big rat

I suggested they come tell me face to face
"We can't" they said, "we're Track and Trace
We don't want to be catching it too
We just need your secret PIN from you"

So I told them I hadn’t been past my gate
Since we were told to self isolate
For months I haven’t even been to Town
That was when they put the bloney receiver down!

As that nice Mr Peston says "let me be clear"
This bogus call could cost you dear
Don't be fooled into opening your purse
'Cos this cure for Corona will be much worse!

Joan Etoile

Non Discrimination - Diane Scantlebury

A virus knows no boundaries
It doesn’t recognize colour or race,
It cares not for wealth or status
A lethal enemy without a face,
A virus has simple requirements
To infiltrate, infect, replicate,
It has no respect for gender or age
It doesn’t discriminate,
Some think they’re invincible
They’ll distort and bend the rules,
They’ll gamble with the lives of others
They are chancers and inconsiderate fools,
In a crisis some thrive on hindsight
Always seeking someone else to blame,
They’re the reckless and the idiots
A virus can’t distinguish,
And will treat them all the same!

Diane Scantlebury