Sample Poetry

Useless Medusa

Medusa Minutiae: alopecia sufferer,

No fork tongued sizzling serpent scalp for her,

But nano-sized nematodes, slithering unseen.

What use this see-thru swim cap without sheen,

To a mythical snake-hair who’s meant to be mean?

Should she, Medusa shun shampoo or use less,

Hairspray and products; should she brush and mousse less?

So she summoned a stylist: Perseus so called,

Who on reflection claimed he was appalled,

By useless Medusa whose scalp was quite bald.

Percy was scissorless but he was not dismayed,

With his shimmering, talon sharp, shiny new blade,

Determined to snip and trim what simply would not grow:

Medusa’s worm weave with its wriggling go slow,

Received from his salon hands, one final cut and blow.

'Useless Medusa' appears on Todd Swift's 'Eyewear' blog.

http://toddswift.blogspot.com/2006/01/poem-by-heln-thomas.html

Cuni Verse: Goddess and Poet

and not of this Earth

She wears baad ass batik

And a velveteen sash

Looks like a sad acid trip

That’s been out on the lash

She’s a poet and a deaconess

Her talent is transparent

Diaphanous in her address

Orally she’s arrant

Bisexual in the sixties

She’s the high priestess of weird

She believes in elves and pixies

She’s got stardust in her beard

Her lexicon’s homespun tie dyed

She weaves her words with woad

And woe betide those who’d deride

Her deftly knitted odes

She’s ventured into voodoo

And she’s sampled stuff that’s Sapphic

She’s shown her arse in Burton’s window

And halted all the traffic

She chatrooms on a ouija board

With people who are dead

Drinks ‘shroom tea from crafted gourds

And then she goes to bed

Where she dreams of ancient loves

Mindful of incarnations

Brief encounters, cherubs, doves

Rendezvous in railway stations

Waking up in purple PJ’s

With an urge to cough and spit

Back ache brings on dreams of bidets

As she takes a shit

She wonders where she lost the time

And tree-like gained the girth

As autumn leaves her swirling mind

Composts into the earth

Published in an online edition of 'The Ugly Tree' as part of The Poetry Library's online archive.

http://poetrymagazines.org.uk/magazine/recordb0d9.html?id=22254

The people want bread not circus

Today,

where yesterday's bakery stood:

grease-painted clowns, jugglers, monkeys

and budgies on tiny fire engines;

strings of elephants following the leader;

a moustachioed ringmaster in top hat and tails;

tigers and lions leaping through hoops and rings of fire,

beneath dare-devil trapeze, barking seals balancing balls;

pretty ponies whose bare back riders

are spangly cowgirls who also assist

blind folded knife-throwers who never miss.

And finally: fireworks, balloons and confetti,  

with wild applause and open mouthed awe,

then I returned home,

having forgotten what I left the house for.

This poem was published on the now defunct Nth Position website.

Protection

Beware the spores! They are growing bigger, more numerous and better organised,

(except for the ones that are getting smaller; so small as to be invisible to the human eye.)

They attract their victims by emitting a unique bait of pheromone musk-scent that smells

of money and admiration. They are artificially intelligent; they learn from mistakes.

We can sell you goggles.

Tick the box if you'd like to receive a catalogue.

There's an unseen Disney film locked in a vault. It's about a beautiful forest

full of cute animals who all love each other. They can all sing, dance and talk.

They're all vegetarians and their individual foodstuff of choice can be found in abundance,

along with clean spring water, which bubbles into sparkling streams.

The animals frolic joyously and have lots and lots of fun.

Nothing else happens; it's all quite lovely.

They all live happily ever after from beginning to end.

Not available to buy.

There's a worm made of tar. It has no skin or bones. It feeds off plasma and platelets

and wears the walls of your blood vessels as its exoskeleton.

It divides by binary fission, doubling and doubling like time-lapse gothic botulism.

You can see it spreading underneath your skin, filling your capillaries until they creak.

You'll be compelled to rip out those strangling black threads

like faulty electrics or rapacious weeds.

There are procedures: we can arrange to have your veins lined with lead.

Tick the box if you'd like us to send you a catalogue.

Your statutory rights are not affected.

This poem was published on the now defunct Nth Position website. I later set it to music.