Nostalgiad

In Competition No. 2406 you were invited to write a nostalgic poem about commercial products or brand images that are no longer with us. ‘O my Brylcreem and my Trugel long ago!’ sighed Tony Dawson. ‘Just bring me my Seebakrascope,’ begged John Whitworth (for those of you too young to remember, this was a miniature periscope, advertised in the 1950s, which showed what was going on behind you). Ah, Carter’s Little Liver Pills, Gibbs’ Dentifrice (to protect your ‘ivory castles’), Roboline, Elliman’s Athletic Rub, Fuller’s Walnut Cake, Spangles, the Bisto Kids, Bile Beans, the Rank Gong Man, Gripfix (the glue that smelt of almonds), Antiphlogistine for inflamed bronchials…. As Auden said about lakes, ‘Just reeling off their names is ever so comfy.’ The prizewinners, printed below, get £25 each and Godfrey Bullard has £30.

Hot summers brought Snowfrute to savour,
Ice-cold in its cardboardy case,
And Refreshers had fizz in their flavour
Which sizzled up into your face.

The Tippy-Top, deftly rotated,
Could turn upside down as it spun,
While the Glitterwax shapes we created
Had a smell that augmented their fun.

Those spoonfuls of Prunol they fed us
Ensured that our motions were right,
Till Chilprufe and Candlewick led us
To the warm benediction of night.

And Readybrek’s swift preparation
Would send us off healthy to school,
Where Valderma’s discreet application
Could prove even acne was ‘cool’!
Godfrey Bullard

‘You’ve spots now you’re older.’ ‘I know, Aunt’, I told her;
‘I’ve spots, and I think they’re a fixture.’
‘That’s rubbish, you know,’ said the Aunt. ‘I shall go
And buy you some Cherry Blood Mixture.

‘The makers are Clarks: they’re probably sharks,
But they brew up a powerful concoction.
In a fortnight or two, the result will make you
Look a boy one could bid for at auction.’

It wasn’t that fast, but they went off at last,
And my face was as clean as a whistle —
Well, not quite that clean, for I found at sixteen
That I then had to shave off some bristle.

The