In Competition 3356 you were invited to imagine a conversation between some objects that don’t normally talk. This was inspired by the funny/spooky ‘Green Candles’ by Humbert Wolfe (a popular poet in the 1920s and 30s), which ends with these sinister lines:
‘I know her little foot,’ grey carpet said:
‘Who but I should know her light tread?’
‘She shall come in,’ answered the open door,
‘And not,’ said the room, ‘go out any more.’
The cutlery was quite chatty, as were the pots and kettles. It was a shame not to have room for, among others, D.A. Prince’s doormat/car key exchange, Alan Millard’s quarrelsome fish and chips, Jane Smillie’s salt and pepper flirtation, and Adrian Fry’s No. 10 lectern and brolly discussing the PM’s decision to use one but not the other. The winners receive £25.
Said Knife: ‘I think all must agree
I’m monarch of all cutlery.
I cut, I carve, I stab, I slice,
I am a versatile device.’
Said Fork politely: ‘When you’ve hacked
At food, then etiquette and tact
Require me to with style and grace
Convey a morsel to the face.’
Knife cut in with ‘Yes, that’s true,
And grateful am I, friend, that you
Ensure no fragment is let slip.
Ours is a blessed partnership.’
Suave Fork agreed, so as a team,
They with a mutual esteem
Agreed the other was a boon
(But united in contempt for Spoon).
George Simmers
We are too urbane to freak out
At your clumsiness, dear fork,
But we feel we have to speak out
As you stab your spicy pork.
We are elegant and gentle,
Flourish food with calm finesse.
Your aggressive Occidental
Punctures cause us some distress.
You are tapered, you are slender,
Chopsticks dear, you’re slim and fine.
Yes, your hold is subtle, tender,
Less belligerent than mine.
Yet each morsel that I stab I
Know with certainty I own.
Two may cradle, one can jab. I
Choose to play my points alone.
Chris O’Carroll
‘Hello, you’re new. Gosh, you do look dog-eared, poor thing.’
‘Yes, I’m too well-read. She got me in a second-hand bookshop yesterday and seems to be going through me pretty fast.’
‘Lucky bugger. I’ve been on this bedside table for months, with a bookmark stuck right up my ninth chapter and God, it’s uncomfortable! I’m Middlemarch, by the way. I’m by some 19th-century type and must be really hard going.’
‘Sorry to hear that. My cover’s a bit worn, but I’m Fifty Shades of Grey. I reckon she’ll finish me soon and I’ll be back on the road, though you meet some interesting types down at Oxfam.’
‘I’ll be away too, I suspect. Frankly, she’s had me here a few times, gets to page 103 and that’s it, back on the shelf. Mind you, she puts me next to Daniel Deronda, and he’s got a lovely green binding…’
Brian Murdoch
‘Excuse me,’ said a pot, sitting on the back-left ring.
‘You talking to me, sunshine?’ asked the kettle.
‘Sorry to disturb you but I really must apologise.’
The kettle didn’t know what to make of this and said so. ‘Yer what?’
‘I must apologise for what my grandmama said to your grandfather. All those years ago.’
The kettle let out a sigh and a tiny wisp of steam.
‘Oh, that.’
‘It was uncalled for.’
Another wisp. Bigger this time. ‘If she’d said thatin this day and age, mate, she’d have been thrown out for scrap…’
‘I know, it’s too awful.’
‘…melted down probably. And rightly so.’
‘There’s no need to go on,’ said the pot.
‘You started it,’ said the kettle.
Adrian Moss
The kitchen table and its minion stools
were unimpressed by granddad’s favourite chair.
‘The old man left a house, a box of jewels –
and you,’ they said, ‘despoiled by wear and tear.’
‘My legs,’ the chair replied, ‘are bowed with age,
and yet my ornate back and arms are straight
and strong. A carpenter both skilled and sage
created me, so stow your ill-willed hate.’
The toaster laughed: ‘Upon your florid face
our owners stand to change a bulb, or sit
upon you, cheek-to-cheek, when saying grace.
You’re firewood! You’re done for! This is it!’
And so it seemed. The owners took the chair
and sold it at the annual village fête
to one whose antique watch said, ‘Don’t despair!
You’re Chippendale, worth half a million, mate!’
Paul A. Freeman
‘Looks like we’re swapping bums then.’
‘So it seems. How comfortable is yours?’
‘Oh, I can’t complain really. His trousers always feel very luxurious. Savile Row, I believe.’
‘Hmm, well, don’t expect that from my guy. That kind of elitism doesn’t play well with the electorate.’
‘To be honest, I have felt mine sweating a bit more of late. Especially during PMQs.’
‘At least all that squirming gives your leather a bit of a polish. You’re as radiant as an emerald, my good man.’
‘Why, thank you. I’ve had quite a few try me out in recent years. Not like some other benches I could mention.’
‘Ah, our red-leathered friends lording it up in the other place. They get backsides for life there.’
‘And ours can be outlasted by a lettuce. Still, I prefer the variety of asses we get here.’
‘Hear, hear, old boy.’
Jon Robins
No. 3359: Pitch battle
You are invited to submit an account of a historical event expressed as if it were football match commentary (150 words/16 lines maximum). Please email entries to competition@spectator.co.uk by midday on 17 July.
Comments