I dated a girl, a pretty gal
I dated her and her pooch pal
You had to like her dog Pogo
You had to, or it was a no go.
She took the thing everywhere
And never in a pet carrier.
It was sort of a turnoff to me;
A kind of no-intrusion barrier.

Scoochie up to poochie
Or you I wouldn’t  get no *******.
Otherwise I was a pimple.
It was really just that simple.

She had the ugliest mutt
That I ever saw before
Like a brown **** rug
That was left outdoors.
It snuffled through teeth
That were hideously parted.
I thought it was stuffed
Until the creature farted.

Scoochie up to poochie
Or you I wouldn’t get no *******.
Otherwise I was a pimple.
It was really just that simple.

I got nothing against animals
And I really do like dogs
But they should look like pups
Not chimera or warthogs.
I’d overcome the boundaries
Whenever I got the chance
But that ugly canine lump of fur
Put the kibosh on romance.

Scoochie up to poochie
Or you I wouldn’t get no *******.
Otherwise I was a pimple.
It was really just that simple.

I like the smell of cut grass and dew in the morning.
Sunshine and rainbows and when the sky's dawning.

Coffee and baked bread, and crunchy leaves in the autumn.
Singing and dancing, and anything that cures boredom.

Roast chestnuts in winter, and painting and reading.
Skipping stones on the water, warthogs and weeding.

Going on adventures to places unseen by my eye.
Also, cheese and onion crisps and chocolate, at the same time.

The smell of the rain and a good thunder storm.
Blue sky and the starlings when they gather in a swarm.

Anything purple, walking my dog in the evening.
Randomness and laughter, all of these are appealing.

I like music, my long hair and wearing a hat.
My high tops, my guitar, cheese and also my cats.

I like the drum of the rain on a caravan roof.
The thud on the ground from a horses hoof.

The warmth of the sun upon my face.
The crackle from a log burning in the fireplace.

I love my family and friends, and my happy places.
Meeting new people and putting smiles on their faces.

I like birds, all animals and frost on the window.
I love the look of the countryside when it's covered in snow.

A cobweb with raindrops, taking photos and nature.
My book collection, seafood and the blue of a glacier.

I like making cakes, playing risk, and flowers and trees.
Writing poems, walking, reading, and I love bees.

I like the crash of the sea, and the trickle of a stream.
The sunset in Africa, crypic crosswords and a good dream.

I like a lot of things, as you can see.
There is a lot more you don't know about me.

Maybe another poem will pop into my head.
Always at the time when I should be in bed.

When it does I'll write it down somewhere to show.
Then more things about me you shall know.

In the jingle jangle jungle
When the jumping jackals jive,
All the leopards like a-leaping
And the lions look alive;

Watch the wary warthogs writhing
As they waggle and a-wiggle
To the drumming disco dancing
Of the jingle jangle jiggle!

It’s inherent, a ritual passed through ages, fashions change but the outcomes the same. We make ourselves desirable, attractive. We plump out our manes and puff our collars, rouge our cheeks and lips, blood pumping to all our organs. It’s our tribal wear. We soak up sweet alcoholic nectar, loosening our inhibitions and bringing out our inner basic urges.



We hit a club called the watering hole, gorillas on the door filtering out the runts. My paws stick to the floor and the walls drip with sweat. The disco lights burn down on me with a heat like the desert. You can’t move without making eye contact with someone. Single men lean against the walls, and lurk in the shallows like alligators. Waiting for a young philly to wonder past a little worse for wear. Snap. Men dance with their tops off, sweat making their skin glisten like a serpent. The first thing you have to do is get to the bar, its packed and the bodies push against you as all trying to get to the front. The first few drinks numb you and make you confident, you begin to be seduced by the music and dance floor. The air is humid and the smell of smoke has faded away, just leaving the smell of body odour coming from the hippo taking up most of the dance floor. The main smell overpowering all this is ***, pure unfiltered ***, the place reeks of it. This place is a meat market, but there’s all kinds of animal on show. You’ve got your flamingos who stand there beautiful, looked at but not touch, you’ve also got your warthogs content rolling in their filth,  you’ve got your grizzly bears sniffing out the honey. Me I’m a hyena, (laugh) a pack animal, we hunt in small groups, dotted around the stage, causing mischief among the herd, we’re jokers, entertainers, it might all look like a laugh but cross one of us and feel our bite which is certainly worse than our bark.

There’s one though, he’s a lion, king of the beasts, everything else is just meat, he locks onto his target, he stealthy crosses the dance floor to prey on it, there’s plenty of meat around but that’s the one he wants, it’s a game, we lock eyes, I can’t move, it’s survival of the species, and he’s top of the food chain. Once he has me he takes his fill and leaves me to the vultures.

I lick my wounds to start again. And then I realise the hunter has become the hunted.

She had deep deportation eyes
Raven's feather hair
Skin as sweet as molasses
And of the same color there

Her name was never Lita
At least no two times the same
She wore the same old pair of sandals
Learning fast how to play the game

She would let you so close
But never there within
Her body was her refuge
A faultless heart so full of sin

She never took what was not belonging
The world owed her a lot
If she broke the piggy bank
It was all that she had got

In the blackness of the white room
Full of pressed rats and warthogs
She said it was their damnation
A Titanic corting through the fog

The winter came early that season
She felt the heat of I.C.E.
Her skates were best blade thin
Not thick enough for her own device

She had deep deportation eyes
The last time I saw her around
I don't see her at all now
Thinking that makes me frown

Don't worry ‘bout me: I have a nice panga,
A pretty assegai, a Chukchi yaranga,
And I can start fire with some thin tiny twigs
By touching them a bit with my fishnet stockings.

In the Atlas I tamed the last of the lions;
In the Ngorongoro cheetahs feared my irons;
In the Rocky Mountains I made all grizzlies pant;
And in Tamil Nadu tigers purred in my hand.

‘Cuz for kisses, it’s true: I do never resist,
And every man I like, I track him on the pist,
I find him and ******, and finally kiss him.

As for peeled vultures though, hillbilly noisy dogs,
******* or green mambas, stinky naughty warthogs:
I do always cook them but never embrace them...

Read by Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth :
Please note: In the link address, the word "UNDERSCORE" (2x) has to be replaced by the typographic sign of the underscore (Alt+095).

https://www.cjoint.com/doc/18UNDERSCORE05/HEzhgrx8p4AUNDERSCOREIn-love-in-the.mp3

warthogs
trot by
with their tails
in the air.

Never shall I wade,
Never shall I slip.
Into the depths,
Into the ooze.
Into the warm anesthetic flow of self ingratiation,
of fetid tumescent narcissism.

Nor shall I venture into the arenas;
Into those meat-rending chambers of razor- tongued, blunt- brained image brokers.
Rather that the screeching, grunting warthogs and  jackals of the underworld
should feast upon my stinking flesh.