comedy – Page 17 – Robert Garnham

Flexible Jim

Flexible jim
Oh flexible jim
It’s really so incredible
He’s flexible within
He can stand in the hallway
And look in the kitchen
That’s perfectly normal
If you’re flexible Jim

He’s a double jointed fella
He’s a yoga kinda guy
He can peek round corners
And nobody knows why
Flexible jim
Oh flexible Jim
So much complexity
With his flexibility

What is Jim?
Flexible!

I want to chat
To flexible jim
Find out for myself
What secrets lie within
Hey there jim
Let’s meet up and see what’s what
And Jim replied
I can’t do Tuesdays.

The Space Captain has Got a Big Ray Gun

I am the firm-jawed space captain
And this is my sci-fi show.
I’m the randy tough shirt-ripping hero
You know the way it goes.
I’m the brown-haired stubbled morally-upright
Captain of this ship
I’m the father figure hunky macho man
Who never loses his grip.

Each week the show ends
With the threat of evil lessened.
I’m the laser shooting alien bating guy
Who teaches everyone a lesson.
My assistant this whole time has been
An affable old curmudgeon
Who dispenses words of wisdom and sanity
With every alien that i bludgeon.

The producers met last year
And while they were pleased, gosh, I’m so heroic
In my body hugging one piece spacesuit
Making me be both ridiculous and stoic
Decided to give me a new assistant,
A scientist, with test tubes and litmus .
But from the first moment of our first rehearsal
He turned out to be as camp as Christmas.

Viewer figures started to go up.

First day on set he seemed upset and
Insisted on rewriting his script
Pretending to get just a little aroused
At the sight of my shirt getting ripped.
And when we were held captive by then
Evil King Empreror of the Gargantuan Lizard Men he asked, could he
Remark that the Gargantuan Lizard Men were Gargantuan
In every place but the one that they really should be.

To the maniacal plotting demon wizard,
While supposedly undercover
He remarked to him, oh, you’re so butch!
You must get it from your mother.
While running away on Forbius Seven
Pursued by the furious Forbius Sevenese,
He adlibbed the line, ooo, a pair of handcuffs,
Now what shall we do with these?

Viewer figures went through the roof.

To the giant snake like Mega Octopus
Who wouldn’t let us pass,
Presumably unaffected by it’s mind altering powers he said,
Ooo, you’ve got a face like a slapped arse.
And my catchphrase I loved, as I jump into action,
‘Power it up and hit the switch!’
Was replaced by his own insistence by the phrase,
‘Brace yourself, bitch!’

And all those corny jokes about my ray gun.
Don’t point that thing at me.
Gosh, that’s a big one.
Does it shoot as well as it looks?
My my, you’ve polished that one up nicely.
Look at the shaft on that.
Big ones are so much harder to conceal.
Is it difficult to get a good aim with one that size?
I’ve never seen one that shape before.
Keep it covered up, I’ve just had a sausage.

I wanted such fame and tough guy acclaim
But my dreams have all been torpedoed.
It’s hard to have dignity when captured by robots
He says, ooo, were going to get probed!
The scripts for next year
I really do fear
Have just been released by the studio.
And while my name is still in the frame
I’ve been reduced to just a brief cameo.
I was the firm jawed space captain
And now this is his show.

I only love him when he sulks

I only love him when he sulks.
He looks so masculine and tough.
I can’t get enough
Of when he’s off in a huff.
He does something to me deep within.

He’s a normal bloke
And we do normal blokey things
But when he gets in a mood
It makes my heart sing.
He starts a thing he can’t stop
When he gets in a strop.
When a frown overtakes his complexion
I get an immediate . . ..
. . . . . . . Sense of wellbeing.

Be my hunk, be my daddy,
Do it for me, throw a paddy,
Come on big boy let’s have some fun
Please, I’m begging you, go off on one.

Your brooding gets me in the mood
And I’m only in the mood
When you’re in a mood
And when I’m in the mood
It gets you in a mood
Because I’m in the mood
Because you’re in a mood.

I deprive you of burgers
Not for the sake of your health,
But because
You’re never so manly
As when you’re hangry.

In bed last night
It stayed with a low, sultry moan
Only the moan was about
Chunky kit Kat’s not being
As chunky as they used to be.
And then you got that frown
The frown that never gets me down
And I said,
Don’t give me sultry,
Give me sulky,
And you said,
What the bloody hell are you on about?
And I said,
That’s it, just like that.

There’s nothing more annoying than a WhatsApp group

There’s nothing more annoying than a WhatsApp group
A work based compulsory WhatsApp group
It turns your brain to mush
And if turns your mind to soup
There’s nothing more annoying than a WhatsApp group.

There’s a hundred people in it
And they all want attention
It’s ever so mundane
And there’s nothing they won’t mention.
Leave the phone for a moment, though,
For a shower or for a poop
There’s a hundred notifications on
Your work based WhatsApp group.

The mundanity of the things they post
Really gets up my nose
But every fiftieth message is important
Just to keep you on your toes.
I’d delete the app tomorrow
It’s such an annoying thing
I’m getting sick and tired of hearing
That notification ping.

Here’s Judy with her plant pots
And some grandkids I’ve never met
And have you been watching the latest drama?
No! Don’t tell me the ending yet.
And here’s the paint for the living room
And some magnolia for the hall
And just as j decide to ignore the group
Comes word of an urgent conference call.

I’m tired of their emojis, ping!
Just because we all work together.
You don’t have to keep pointing out, ping!
What day it is, or the weather.
So I bitched about it to a friend of mine, Ping!
And told her I’d rather be dead
Than read all this halfwitted crap all the time, Ping,
Mistakenly posted this to the group instead.

Zoo Poo

The skunk
Stunk.
The elephant
Was a smellyphant
The hummingbird
Was humming..
The flamingo
Had BO
And it had
Let one go
The goldfish
In their tank
Were all rank.
The octopus
Was noxious
A flock of bats
Of which there
Was an abundance
Were all pungent.
The arachnid
Was acrid.
The squid
Was putrid.
The giraffe
Had never had a bath
The puffin
Lived on a cliff
And it didn’t half whiff
The river otter
When it was a little hotter
In the middle if Devon
Stank to high heaven.
The swan
Didn’t half pongs
The puma
Had an aroma.
The kangaroo
Smelled like poo
The tortoise
Lived a long life
But it was rife
The mouse
As well as squeaking
Was reeking.
The Mink
Let off a stink.
On his fifth day in his new job,
The zookeeper ran out of air freshner.

The Farting Wizard

He exudes magic.
He exudes spells.
He exudes smells.
He’s the farting wizard.

Hocus pocus
Abracadabra
Someone grab the
Air freshener
He’s the farting wizard.

He can make anyone disappear
He can make anyone vanish
But there’s no magic involved,
Just a high protein diet
He’s the farting wizard.

He’s more stomach churning than merlin.
He’s more hanky over the mouth
Than Gandalf.
He’s more Harry Potty
Than Harry Potter
He’s ever so fond
Of his magic wand
But I wouldn’t want to see his pants
He’s the farting wizard.

He fights evil.
His farts are evil.
He’s strong and silent.
He’s silent but violent.
He lives a hermits existence
In a cave
I wonder why
He’s the farting wizard.

There’s a certain magic
In the air
There’s something else
As well
He’s the farting wizard.

He’s hardly ever petulant
But he is quite flatulent l
His spells might be virulent
But they’re also pungent.
He’s the farting wizard.

Izzy wizzy let’s get busy
Fluffy guffy let’s get whiffy
He might grant you your wishy
But try not to have a sniffy
He’s the farting wizard.

Last Thursday I needed an incantation
To guard against fire breathing dragons
He lit some scented candles
I said, is that a part of the ritual?
He said no, they were for another reason
He consulted his book and said,
By the grace of magic sublime, be gone!
Foul dragon, be gone!
(Pffffffffffgllllllbbbbbb!)

And do you know, they’ve
Not been back?

Life as a poet under lockdown video diary

Here’s a video diary I’ve made about life as an artist under lockdown. It includes a makeup tutorial.

Toothpaste advert Dental expert Argues with god

She’s not an actress at all
She’s got a lab coat
And glasses
And she’s talking ever so slightly
To the left of the camera
About how various experts recommend
A certain brand

And god says lighten up
And she says go pro
And god says lighten up
And she says
You can feel the difference.

She’s persistent.
He’s omniscient.
Her lab coat is sparkling
Unbelievably white
Subconsciously saying to the viewer
‘Our toothpaste must be good
It must be.
It really must be.’

God hasn’t got time for this,
He’s got an earthquake to set off
In twenty minutes
In order to punish a small town in Italy
Because parliament has been
Debating gay marriage.
God is a bastard like that.

Ninety nine percent of dentists
Recommend this brand
She says
And god rolls his eyes because
Thirty eight percent of statistics are just
Someone speaking out of their arse.

I saw an advert the other day and
Some bloke was wearing a white lab coat
And I thought here we go, more toothpaste,
Butq he was a washing machine technician
And he was flogging Calgon,
Whatever the hell that is.

Dazzle with brilliant whiteness.
Thou shalt not question the ways of
Thy lord and master
Removes ninety percent of most plaque.
Thou start not
Covet thy neighbours wifi.
It’s all one
Meaningless slogan
After another.

Do you need those glasses?
Have they actually got lenses in?
Bold frames, aren’t they?
And that clipboard
Just keeping tabs on everything, eh?
These are the questions I’d also
Ask of god, along with,
Why should we worship You?
Even if you are our lord and creator,
Are you really so sensitive?

I said to the dentist,
Why do you always look
So down in the mouth?
At least you get to the
Root of the problem.
A golfer came in and said
Most of my teeth are fine,
But I’ve got a hole in one.

Sorry, that’s
My easily triggered gag reflex.

Lord Whatsisname Liked my Hollandaise

Poem

Lord Whatsisname liked my hollandaise
He really really like my hollandaise
I wandered round
In a daze
The lord he liked
My hollandaise
He also liked my vinaigrette
Peri peri sweet sweet chilli
I was a good cook and this had now been proved
My sauces they were all peer reviewed.

Poetry has no relevance.

Poetry has no relevance. That’s what I hear a lot. Oi, knobhead! Your poetry has no relevence! That’s a hell of a heckle. From my publisher.

But it does. Poetry is useful. Honestly.

I was in an airport. Just minding my own business. Just browsing. Hanging around the arrivals gate with a sign reading JUSTIN BIEBER, you know, just on the off chance. When all of a sudden is call comes up. ‘Is there a poet in the building? This is an emergency! We need a poet!’

Turns out this plane was in trouble. The pilot had collapsed at the controls having had an allergic reaction to a Pot Noodle. And then the co pilot, on hearing that the plane was full of zither players on the way back from a zither convention, succumbed to an undiagnosed zither phobia and became a gibbering, incoherent wreck.

So I’m up in air traffic control and they’ve got a zither player in the cockpit and I’m relaying to him the types of controls that he should be operating.

The aerilon speed flaps are the colour of fine Devonshire cream in the early evening sun.

The throttle control knobs are kind of shaped like a veteran Shakespearean actor stooping to pick up a 20p coin

The rudder pedal is broad and flat like a clumsy child’s first attempt to draw a map of Utah.

The undercarriage lever looks like ennui.

And we did it, we landed that plane, between us, soothing it down to a very smooth landing lulled by sonnets and iambic pentameter, just a classy addition of enjambement on its glide slope, we landed it, oh yes, we did, and everyone was saved!

And at that moment I saw the potential of poetry in all its glory to affect the world as a power to be used for the greater good, elevating ordinary souls above the gods and deities, for are we not all messiahs of the modern age, we poets, we brave poets, pens aloft like spears of triumph!

Poetry. Is. Useful.
Hooray!

And then I got home to my normal life of crushing loneliness.