Working Out

I hate those women who work out
- their muscled, sanctimonious bums -
why must they always jog about
and boast of weight-loss to their chums?

I watch them as they swoop and rush
to thwack the ball round tennis courts
and bet they’ve all got raging thrush
inside their skintight lycra shorts.

I hate the way they go for runs -
why don’t they stop to lean on gates,
dance blues to sky-larks, guzzle buns,
write sonnets, eat off cardboard plates?

I wish they’d read and laze and dream,
pick asphodel and bubble ballads -
instead of which they give up cream
and toy with cautious tuna salads.

If they would only binge on chips
- while scribbling plots of love or gore -
they might get bigger round the hips
but oh – I’d like them so much more!

(From Dancing Blues to Skylarks
First published in The Spectator)

Unexpected Passenger

Classic FM spills memories in my car.
As I drive northwards on the motorway
landmarks fly past with disconcerting speed
- but I travel backwards: hear again

the muffled boom of bells beneath the sea
a swish of censers swinging through the waves
the chant of salt-corroded psalms
and plainsong drowned by the swell of the tide.

You play Debussy on the Steinway
before dinner and notes float up the stairs"
to summon me from the end
of the dark passage where silence is my enemy.

I flit in my white night-dress
to sit illicitly on the top step,
caught in a spell of sound, while you conjure
caverns and shells and a lost congregation.

Now, as the prelude fades,
your presence lingers and I recall
the tolling of another bell on a Welsh hillside
- feel again the airtight disapproval

of the grown-ups at your way of life
and all those talents scattered
with such prodigality, but… I thank you
for the music that you gave a child.

(From Dancing Blues to Skylarks
First published in The Spectator)

Shall We Go Alternative?

I used to find it too much rush
with Church and Sunday Lunch,
but now I go with New Age Friends
to Meditation Brunch:
while we contemplate our navels
and eat Vegie kedgeree
I pine for Bloody Marys
- but there's only Herbal Tea.

We're learning Paneurythmy;
we go dancing every dawn
- in our Barbours and green wellies -
on a sacred stretch of lawn.
Next week we're starting classes
to "heal the child within"
where you learn guilty feelings
are a kind of New Age sin.

We can energise a chackra
and see an aura flicker -
which is certainly more thrilling
than a sermon from the Vicar!
We clank with Celtic crosses,
draped in bangles, beads and serapes;
we're blessed with many ailments
- and we're loving all the therapies.

I go for weekly channelling
- Burnt Feathers is my guide.
In a previous incarnation
he says he was my bride.
He is very wise and holy
but it's well within his range
to give me helpful little hints
about the Stock Exchange.

Reflexology's as easy
as falling off a ladder:
you press the sole of someone's foot
- and activate their bladder!
I'm trying Crystal Healing,
and find that Acupressure
has done wonders for my sex life
- makes my husband so much fresher.

I subscribe to lots of Healing mags
and gobble up each issue, and I never leave the house without
a charged up Kleenex tissue;
I book on every Shrine crawl
- I've got hooked on Holy Water -
when I've learnt to travel astrally
the journeys may seem shorter.

BUT in Metamorphic Massage
as I toned my special note,
I suddenly got smitten
with a streptococcal throat.
I MUST HAVE PENICILLIN!
Though it means committing perjury
I'll say I'm at the Yoga class
- and sneak off to the surgery!

(From Thinning Grapes
Also read on Poetry Please - Radio 4)

Denominations

"Religion, dear?" she asked
consent form held
below her sterile smile.
"Christian" I answered:
- one can always hope.
"It means WHAT DENOMINATION, DEAR,"
she said.

"Christian," I tried again
Lying in silly bath-cap, baby's gown
awaiting my Pre-Med.
She thought me simple in the head.

"No, no, that isn't what it means.
What church do you attend?
I need it for my file."

"CHRISTIAN," I bellowed,
cross, unchristian-like.
"I worship God in any church
it's all the same to him
if not to us."
She said I mustn't make a fuss
- they'd need to know which minister
to call in case I died.

Such words of comfort!
"Let them all come and save my soul,
I'll need their prayers if I am dead.
Religion isn't rationed - yet,"
I said.

"They'd want to know about the burial,"
she answered, sharper now,
thinking me frivolous.
Eyes roll towards her friend:
"We meet all sorts!"

A needle brought our conversation
to an end: I had no time to pray.

"Oh put her down as C. of E."
I heard the sister say.

(From Patterns in the Dark.
First published in The Anthology of New Christian Poetry edited by Dr Alwyn Marriage Collins/Flame)