Enter! in welcome, attend!
Come! Make ingress
to my gardens and feel
(full in the chops)
the gusty wind-whips and the hot-throbbing sun-pulses (south-facing).
O! sweet stinking flora of my elysian precincts; deeply breathe – breathe deeply!
close both or more of your peepers and, rump-downwards
(on my lounger, pool-adjacent)
sip the pimms no. 1 which, into your sweaty palms, I have proffered.
For herein is offered chitter-chatter
on this or thatter matter.
I.
unto the museum of motorcycles weekending this; who to be champion of all the english?
not I, surely, for I failed to q
(times tried: 1 by 2),
“alas!” he cries.
much talk of gary wise (anglophile, adopted son) and others whose placentae were not disposed on british soil, our THUNDER for to steal
(we’ll see, of course);
MY hard-earned rides upon the back of Ormerod – if there’s any folk in justice.
II.
Following earlier seed-time, a fine crop is growing,
deep-rooted
(photosynthesising,
sugars accumulating)
in the vege-patch:
Rocket Launcher,
Basking Beetrootwalla,
Naf’s Asparagus,
Mindless Tomaton,
Mox Courgette,
Marrow, Butternut Quash,
Potatogs (Elvish Piper and King Redward),
Parsnap,
Carrotting Giant,
Path Of Peas, Legumerdemain, Viashino Runner Beans,
Brokkolli,
Mana Leek,
Bog Gnarrlic,
Artichoke,
and COP: Greens.
Don’t be so ungrateful – I broke my back, tilling.
III.
the summer magic house, extended,
smelling of creosote and melted plastic, floor dead-flied,
it waits for a new occupier:
goodbayou to the old,
taiga trip,
regardez les plateautudes,
the demise of dual lands is some badlands.
Woe to the collectors, with their tundrae in deck protectors.
IV.
the pond (safely bounded for fear of little tragedies): w-w-weedy-bordered, lilies roughly ordered in amongst. the coy and the carp (harp on), so many tadpoles. Oh to be a Heron in the Summertime.
V.
Wily, aged, raynard that I am, here’s fun for this balmy P dot M;
come into the garden,
lawn (freshly-shaved),
and croquet (the verb, not the noun).
“You’ll need a 60 card deck for this – but don’t just pick any one, oh no! Wait until the form of this variant has been expressed and then, to your folders, retire!
The goal, the aim,
of this poetically-enunciated game,
is to deal (in toto)
100 points of damage to one’s oppo
but IN STAGES, piece-by-piece.
In steps of ten shall you progress,
Aided by the counterspell or duress,
each deca-marker cannot be exceeded,
from each (once achiev-ed)
you start again as if from nought.
And when the score of ninety reached
There’s just one more barrier 2B breached
A final batch of pain dispense
TWENTY POINTS and, thence,
to victory
(In simple words: every time you’ve dealt ten damage, or dealt enough damage to go from <10 to >10, you have passed a HOOP. Reset the ‘damage dealt’ to zero and aim for the next hoop. When you’ve hit the ninety milestone, you need to score 20 points – is that clear enough for you?)
VI.
BLYTHE SPIRIT (2/3, Flying. Attacking does not cause ~ to tap) by Noel (Callofthe) Cowherd
Act I Scene I
(A beautifully-appointed 1930’s entrance hall with hat stand, coat-hooks, and elephants-foot umbrella store. Copies of ‘Country Living’ and ‘Posh Folk Messing About In Boats’ lie, stylishly, upon a bureau. Reggie and Bunty burst through the stain-glassed, oak door in sodden raincoats. Reggie is carrying a steering wheel, Bunty is carrying Hepatitis B)
Reggie (throwing his hat onto the hat-stand and his coat to the floor): What ho! Bingo! Frippery and japes! Benji’s block party was a topping do, what?
Bunty (fainting, and then getting up again): O, Wedgie! I find those tournaments such a bore. Donchaknow that Magic: The Gathering is so passe?
Reggie: Is it, really? Well, we’d better give it up, then!
Satisfaction? I don’t think so.