COMPETITION

Loony aunts, etc.

Jaspistos

IN COMPETITION NO. 2129 you were invited to supply a poem describing the eccentricities of a real or imaginary relative.

It was only last year that it occurred to me that Lear's eccentric Uncle Arly was, a bit unclearly, a joke. He and Wodehouse and Saki must be reckoned the great liter- ary specialists in this area, though T.S. Eliot can put in a claim by virtue of his maiden aunt, Helen Slingsby, owner of a parrot and a Dresden clock, and his cousin, Miss Nancy Ellicott, 'who smoked and danced all the modern dances'. Among the oddities you portrayed, I enjoyed Chris Tingley's Aunt Jemima, who had a 'wood-louse thing', and Basil Ransome-Davies, whose nephew Bill is an

Old Rugbeian who collects single Argyle socks.

The prizewinners, printed below, have £25 each, and the bottle of the Macallan Single Malt Highland Scotch whisky belongs to Godfrey Bullard.

Her audience listened in wonder When Cousin Evadne held forth,

With 'Lightning's much safer than thunder,'

And 'South winds blow down from the North.' She'd kept, as a pet, a black mamba; Maintained she had Eskimo blood; Crossed traffic lights always on amber, And gave precise dates for the Flood; Walked slowly when showers descended — `It's rushing that wets you in rain!' And, once knowing how the plays ended, Would never watch Shakespeare again; To remind her, kept handkerchiefs knotted, But of what was unable to say; And harvested fruit till it rotted, When she carefully threw it away.

(Godfrey Bullard) It's not because she smokes cheroots I find Aunt Bertha odd.

It's not because she keeps pet newts, Communes with park-bench destitutes, Or thinks that in high-buttoned boots She's fashionably shod.

But she is odd; by saying so I do her no injustice.

For rank and custom she has no Respect; and she persists, although Aware that I was christened Beau, In calling me Augustus.

She's odd. What makes it worse, by God, She's got the nerve to think Pm odd!

(Ray Kelley) Legendary in life, and after life, Aunt Dora shed normality as though It were soft butter on a heated knife: Where angels feared, Aunt D. was sure to go.

Her breakfast was a pharmacy, her way With tablets matched her willingness for gin And sardines which, throughout each reeking day, She'd fork directly from the oily tin.

She killed a dozen cats with kindness, yet Her 'bird' survived — a cross-eyed cockatiel As did a bloated goat. Her strangest pet? The scorpion in the teapot. Or the eel. Religiously diverse, she died a Moonie She'd tried the Quakers, Mormons, Scottish Free.. .

Her married name (he disappeared) was Clooney - Pronounced, we used to say, with silent C.

(Andrew Gibbons) There were Jean, Will and me, plus our Ma, And we did what we could, in our fashions, But our family meanness went far To rule out the commoner passions.

We were all of us mad about Jean, The family thought her a poppet. She got trapped in the washing machine, And it seemed rather wasteful to stop it.

But Ma came walking downstairs And looked at the scene and exploded: `That'll cost us a bomb in repairs!

Can't you see the machine's overloaded?'

After that, Mother left us and ran.

`It's much cheaper,' she wrote, 'to feed three.

Turn the heat off as much as you can, And don't send the bills on to me!'

(Paul Griffin) Aunt Jacqui's a scaffold erecter But don't call her Jacqui, it's `Jack'; She loves fags and booze And wears wicked tattoos On her belly and bosom and back.

Jack once gored a meter attendant, Then forced him to swallow his hat; She demolished three pubs And two working men's clubs Just because the draught bitter was flat.

Mum reckons her sister's a nutter - 'The Devil's done things to her head'; Okay, she's no saint, But a sinner she ain't - She's my Jack, she's my Auntie; 'nuff said.

(Mike Morrison)