performance poetry – Page 29

Hypnotism

Look into my eyes
I’m going to put you in a trance.
When I count to three
You’ll open your eyes and
you’ll be an audience at a poetry gig.
1,2,3.

Let me hypnotise this chap.
When I say the magic word, maybe
He’ll be the walrus
And I’ll be the narwhal
And he’ll nuzzle me,
Oh, how he’ll nuzzle me,
Nuzzle me you walrus freak,
You sexy feral walrus freak.
The magic word will be
Anne Widdecombe.

I tried to hypnotise my aunt
make her think she was a donkey.
didn’t work.
She just did her knitting.
I tried to hypnotise a donkey
Into thinking she was my aunt.
Amazingly it did some knitting
And looked just like my aunt.
then I realised I’d just
Hypnotised my aunt
Into thinking she was my aunt
Which is what she was.

I saw the man of my dreams
And I started my old routine
Pendulous pocket watch tick tock pocket watch
I know this might sound creepy
But you are feeling sleepy
On the count of three you’ll wake and see
That you should spend your life with me
And he replied
Do you want to go large
For an extra 65p?
I went home.

My friend Eric
Is really mesmeric.
And because he’s so mesmeric
He’s known as mesmeric Eric
He can walk into a fishmongers
And just the raising of an eyebrow
Can get him as much free hake
As he can shake a stick at.
He lives in Falmouth.

I asked my ex if I could
Hypnotise him.
I said it will be over before you know it.
He said, usual then.
I said, you won’t feel a thing.
He said, usual then.
I said, it might put you to sleep.
He said, sounds about right.
I said, parts of it will be a bit sloppy.
He said, story of my life.
I said, afterwards you might feel a bit humiliated.
He said.
We are talking about hypnotism, right?
I said, and then we might just kind of drift apart
And the next time I see you you’ll be with a much
Younger thinner more handsome hypnotist
Called Kevin
Who means everything to you
And you’re all over each other
And I wonder if secretly it’s because you’re trying to
Prove to me that I meant absolutely nothing
And then you introduce me to him and say,
This is Kevin, he’s an optometrist.
I don’t care what Star sign he is.

I told him a joke
About wheat
He said
It was corny.

When he used to work in a bank i once came in
And asked what do you with all my sultanas.
He suggested a currant account.

I asked him to think of a number
Between one and nine.
He said, Anne Widdecombe.

A poem about eyebrows

Nobody I know
Has more than two eyebrows,
Not even Jennifer.
And I’m quite content
With the two that I’ve got
Thanks for asking.

I looked at them through a microscope.
A thousand bristly hairs
On each side give or take,
Squint and your can really see
The follicles.

My friend Russell
Has really loud eyebrows
It’s why he’s called Russell
It’s because they rustle.

Mine look like punctuation
I don’t know what font
But it ain’t Times New Roman.
They’re like moustaches
That have migrated north.
Imagine them all over your manly torso,
Steven,
You’d look like a shaved Chewbacca.

My left one is called Daphne

But oh, I’m sure we’ve all done it.
Balanced a bottle nosed dolphin
On the top of my glasses
To hide my eyebrows from the casual observer
But my forehead kept getting moistened
By its blowhole.

I wake in the middle of the night
With eyebrow cramp.
Early morning mist clings to them
Whenever it’s damp.
I sprinkled them with glitter
But it looked a bit camp.
The security guard at the
Caterpillar sanctuary
Stopped me on the way out.
Just checking, he said,
Just checking.

Interesting fact.
If a sperm whale had eyebrows
They’d be big enough
To use as an ironing board.

The fortune cookie said,
‘A frown becomes a Glare
Without eyebrows there.’
Just because it rhymes
Doesn’t mean it’s true
Does it.

Geoff’s eyebrows are parabolic
They make me feel euphoric
With their eyebrow up down
Wriggle wriggle
Boom titty boom titty
Watch them jiggle jiggle
Naughty Geoff!
Naughty Geoff!
Your eyebrows are orgasmic!

An eyebrow fetishist
Wanted to lick them.
And the more startled I looked,
The more it turned him on.

I phoned him up
And rustled them on the speaker.
Apparently in the fetish community
This is called Just Browsing.

He came at me one night
And trimmed them with some scissors.
But I suppose that’s what happens with
Internet grooming.

Eyebrows, eyebrows, eyebrows.
Whenever I go on Google.

The elastic has gone in my boxer shorts

Something’s not right
It’s an odd complaint
There’s a certain looseness
Where there used to be restraint.
I get no joy
From my morning coffee cup.
The elastic has gone in my boxer shorts
And they won’t stay up.

The world has got such problems
With wars and such.
But there’s a certain sagginess
In my crotch.
I thought it would be fine
I guess I’m out of luck
The elastic has gone in my boxer shorts
And they won’t stay up.

Things just fall apart,
That’s entropy,
But now my only enemy
Is gravity
I rang the customer service desk,
They couldn’t give a toss,
The elastic has gone in my boxer shorts
And they won’t stay up.

Nothing lasts forever,
It makes my life hell
They used to be a large
Now they’re XXXXL
I hung them on the washing line
A squirell used them as a hammock
The elastic has gone in my boxer shorts
And they won’t stay up.

They twist and flop and tangle
Whenever they get the chance.
The man this morning is Tesco said,
Hey that’s a crazy dance
As I swivelled and gyrated
All around the town
The elastic has gone in my boxer shorts
And – oh no! – they’re down.

Robert Garnham Delivers a Ted (Style) Talk

Welcome to my Ted Talk
(My clicker isn’t working)
Welcome to my Ted Talk
(My clicker isn’t working)

How are we going to solve
Various big big things?
Three golden rules!
(Shame about my clicker)

Coming in to the coffee shop
I’m the bastard looking for
A power socket
Charging up my laptop
Charging up my laptop
Charging power to power my
Power point presentation
I have the power!

If I do this
(:::::::::::::;;;:;;)
You’ve just witnessed me doing it
And that’s an example of
POSITIVE THINKING!
Three golden rules!

1. Achieve the continuous
2. Apply it like a haberdasher
3. Can be split into twenty four subheadings

(This clicker is not working!)

If I put my hand in my pocket
And wander around
It makes me look more relaxed!!!

You’ve got to understand
That people
Always make
The wrong decisions.

Welcome to my Ted Talk!
Smug!
Life hacks!
(Fourteen different subheadings)

You can usually work out EXACTLY where
The bus will stop
And this will save you
TIME and ENERGY

There are eight different things I learned
SMUG BASTARD
When I lost my luggage while backpacking
(This clicker is just not working)

If I do this
(;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;)
It’s an example of sonic dissonance.

Madam, when did you last knowingly
Have spaghetti?

MY BOAT SANK!
And I didn’t even get slightly wet
My life is charged with a new purpose
I learned twelve new things!
Twelve new LIFE HACKS
LIFE HACKS
LIFE HACKS
LIFE SUCKS!

(This clicker is getting on my tits)

1. Technology
2. Murdering people is generally frowned on.
3. The power of positive thinking!
4. This clicker this clicker this clicker this clicker
5. I know six people called Ted and they all talk

Power point presentation validate it
Power point presentation validate jr
Let’s just validate if shall we?
This is an aha moment

Take on me!

You!
You fiend!
You bastard!

It’s a unifies mental model, Mrs McGough
It’s visual interaction.
It’s.
The.
Same.
As.
Every.
Damn.
Ted.
Talk.

This clicker
Definitely
Is not working.

Thank you.

I went on a tour of Rudyard Kipling’s flat

I went on a tour of Rudyard Kipling’s flat.
This is where we think he slept.
This is where we think he wrote.
It’s always good to commune with literary heroes.

I went on a tour of Rudyard Kipling’s flat.
This is where we think he read.
This is where we think he got dressed in the morning.
The years pile on with each tour of the sun.

I went on a tour of Rudyard Kipling’s flat.
This is where we think he did the washing up.
This is where we think he used to go to the loo.
There’s a gift shop at the exit.
We all grow old before our time.

I went on a tour of Rudyard Kipling’s flat.
This is where we think he wrote letters.
This is where we think he ate vegetables.
We’re pretty sure
That Rudyard Kipling used to live here.

I don’t even like Rudyard Kipling.

The Ballad of a Lovesick Smurf

I feel blue most of the time
As blue as blue can be
The world is full of lonely men
But there must be a smurf for me

An acquamarine companion
Who’d run in the surf for me
Kissing like lovers on the beach
There must be a smurf for me

There are so many smurfs
They dance on the turf you see
It’s so bloody smurfing annoying
There must be a smurf for me

It’s my absolute conviction
A belief since birth you see
They’re blue and there are so many
There must be a smurf for me.

A dearth of smurfs is worse
Than a joke without mirth for me
I’ve wandered each corner of the earth
There must be a smurf for me.

I don’t like cylindrical things

I don’t like
Cylindrical things
Rolling pins
Hot dogs and
Cucumbers.
The number one.
The tunnel
Under the Humber.
It’s why I could never
Be a plumber.

I don’t like
Cylindrical things
Petrol tankers
Rolls of cling film
Give me the creeps
The front blades
Of a combine harvester
Keep me awake for weeks

I don’t like
Cylindrical things
Courgettes stop me working
Nothing worse
Than a gherkin

I’m okay with a boat
But not with a barge
The wings of a plane are ok
But not the fuselage
It’s looks like a sausage
My whole day is on song
Until I see something
that’s oblong.

I don’t like
Cylindrical things
People think
I’m rude
I cannot do
With a canoe
I’d much rather have a raft.
Toothpaste tubes
Are daft
Pencils are ok
But not the shaft.

I cannot send off for
A poster
If they come wrapped
In a cylinder
My heartbeat goes irregular
And I become less
Than jocular
When I see something
That’s tubular.

I don’t like
Cylindrical things
My sister would hate to see
A spider
I’d hate to see
The large hadron collider
And when my neighbours
Car caught fire
He yelled
Get the fire extinguisher
And I said no
And his car burnt to the ground
And now he won’t speak to me.

I don’t like
Cylindrical things
This includes
Pringles tins
Once you pop
You can’t stop
Only I can’t pop
And All those chimney pots
Ended my career as a
Roofer
I freak out
In the shower
If there’s a loofer

I don’t like
Cylindrical things
Ladder rungs
Rolled up rugs
Sausage dogs
Binoculars
Monoculars
Telescopes
Turrets and other architectural flourishes
Wellington boots with the shoe part cut off

Autobiography of a performance poet

How the dickens did I get to become a performance poet? This is a question that many people have asked me. So I’ve written an essay in two parts which answers that exact question. And for you, gentle listener, I have managed to probe exactly what it means to be me, Robert Garnham.

A two part piece of autobiographical writing about my life and what led me to becoming a spoken word artist and performance poet.

This essay takes me from childhood in Surrey and my first attempts at writing, through school, college and my first jobs, and finally to discovering performance poetry in 2009.

I hope you enjoy it!

Part One

Part Two

I wish I was a squid

I wish I was a squid
Dreaming squiddy dreams
All squid like on the surfaces
And squidlike in between.

I wish I was a squid
With my gigantic eyes
The fact I cannot blink
Makes me look surprised.

I wish I was a squid
Or possibly a pheasant
Whichever one of the two
Is slightly phosphorescent

I wish I was a squid
On eBay I would bid
On things that keep me hid
From predators that eat squid.

I wish I was a squid
A whimper not a bang
I’m such a damp squib
I’m such a damp squid

I wish I was a squid
The things that I would do!
Going up to Jellyfish
And saying, how do you do?

I wish I was a squid
A squid is what I’d be
People’d ask if I was a squid
And I’d say yes that’s me.

I wish I was a squid
Long tentacles aid my loving
That’s why they don’t call me
The giant squid for nothing

I wish I was a squid
I would have such focus
Sitting in a vase all day
Actually, that’s a crocus

I wish I was a squid
Swimming in the depths
Keeping an eye on people’s lunch
Don’t touch that, it’s Jeff’s.

I wish I was a squid
Or some other invertebrate
Squeezing into tiny gaps
Even though it might hurt a bit

I wish I was a squid
In fact it makes me angry
I don’t have any tentacles
And none of my bits are dangly.

If you like what I’m doing, feel free to buy me a coffee any time

https://ko-fi.com/robertgarnham

You’re not so much a vampire like you used to be

You’re not so much a vampire these days, he said.
You don’t seem to be
As vampiric as previous.
No, I replied, glad you noticed that.

I used to suck life out of the obvious
Delirious in the midsummer heat.
Now I just suck
Um-Bongo from cardboard cartons
While watching Pointless.

My life is pointless.

All the good things happen during daytime hours.
It’s why I didn’t see Wimbledon again this year.
Another August without a decent summer holiday
No frolicking on the beach for me
No diving boats swim pool back flips
No crazy afternoons playing frisbee in the park.
Now I spend all of my time indoors
Writing an incredibly long poem about an ice cream.

It’s my magnum opus.

The exquisite tenderness and violence
Of sinking ones fangs into the neck
Of a maiden
Cannot match
A custard cream biscuit and a nice cup of tea.
And then you don’t have to hang around
For all eternity with them.
Eternity is such a waste of time.

How do I look?
I haven’t had a good shave in years.
Every morning in the mirror,
A Bic disposable razor hanging in mid air.
Even the undead get stubble.

I’m not as vampiric as I once was.
I’ve given up on all those late night japes.
No sir.
Not for me.
Fangs for that.
I’m a suburban vampire with agoraphobic tendencies
Cos it’s so much safer to stay at home.
I’m not going to get caught out again
Like I did during the eclipse.

I’m a stay at home vampire
A have a moan vampire
A cold dark feel alone order dinner on the phone vampire
I’ve ploughed through every single
Last of the Summer Wine box set
And now I’ve started on Only Fools and Horses.
My kettle is free of build up,
I’m Vlad the Descaler.
I’ve spent all my time making
Little suits for non existent tiny mythical creatures,
I’m Vlad the Imp Tailor
I no longer exercise at the leisure centre
I’ve fled the gym trainer
The world I see is the world without me
And that is why I’m really not
As vampiric as I used to be.

I’m glad you noticed.
Nobody else was going to say anything,
You were the first to
Stick your neck out.