Just Where You Left It... and Other Poems Read online

  Contents

  Introduction

  Just Where You Left It

  Could Do Better

  My Dad Is Sooo Embarrassing

  We Have Ways of Making You Eat

  The Poetry Recitation

  Emojis

  For Goodness’ Sake – Let’s Take a Break…

  Common Entrance Latin

  Two in a Row

  I’m Not Very Well…

  Guidelines for the Sidelines

  Finding a Mate

  Dad Got C- for My Homework

  The Best Advice

  The Sports Day

  No Room for Us on the Bus

  Social Not-Working

  Prize Giving

  Frankly, Mrs Butler…

  Bully for You

  Thank You, Baby Boomers

  If You Bill It, They Will Come

  About the Author

  Acknowledgements

  Supporters

  Dedication

  Copyright

  Dear Reader,

  The book you are holding came about in a rather different way to most others. It was funded directly by readers through a new website: Unbound. Unbound is the creation of three writers. We started the company because we believed there had to be a better deal for both writers and readers. On the Unbound website, authors share the ideas for the books they want to write directly with readers. If enough of you support the book by pledging for it in advance, we produce a beautifully bound special subscribers’ edition and distribute a regular edition and e-book wherever books are sold, in shops and online.

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  Introduction

  As parents, many of us are more than willing to drive our kids around, attend their school events, participate where necessary and generally do our bit. But there is a limit.

  For me, the annual school poetry competition was the one. We were all tired of the same old poems being regurgitated, and my eldest son asked me to write one for him to read out. One with a bit more relevance. And more laughs. He didn’t win, but “The Poetry Recitation” went down well so I did the same thing the next year for son number two. By the time it was the third son’s turn, we won the damn thing.

  That winning poem was “Just Where You Left It” and you’ll find it here, alongside other poems that reflect on the more amusing aspects of families and modern life. Whether the theme is school rituals or family holidays, breaking the rules, friendship or the many embarrassing faults that parents possess, I have tried to cast a humorist’s eye over them all in verse form. And attempted to make them rhyme. Most of the time.

  I hope you enjoy them.

  David Roche

  Just Where You Left It

  “Mum, I can’t find my shin pads and it’s football today.

  It’s the 3rds v St Wotsits and we’re playing away.

  They’ve got that big bruiser who plays at the back.

  Where the hell are my shin pads? He is prone to hack.”

  “They’re just where you left them. Why’s your memory so poor?

  Right under the radiator by the back door.”

  “Mum, I can’t find my door key, I think it’s been stolen.

  Or maybe it fell from my pocket with the hole in.

  So it is partly your fault. Can you get me another?

  You did it for Daniel, and he’s my big brother.”

  “Conspiracy theory is not a bad call,

  But it’s right where you left it, on the tray in the hall.”

  “Mum, I can’t find my biro, and it’s not ‘where I left it’.

  I used it for homework so don’t even suggest it.

  I left it right here so you must have moved it.

  It’s your fault, it’s obvious, and ha!, I’ve just proved it.”

  “You’ve got me. I’m guilty. Arrest me. But wait…

  What’s that, where you left it, right under your plate?”

  So how do mums do that? They have a sixth sense

  For locating my iPhone or an old fifty pence.

  It’s the same for our dad too. If he needs the remote,

  He just asks our mum and it’s Murder She Wrote…

  “If you got off your backside and looked under the couch,

  It’s there, where you left it, now mow the lawn.” Ouch.

  There must be a cheat way that mums win our deference.

  They hide stuff, and map it, then learn the grid reference.

  They memorise items and their hidden location,

  Then have all the answers, like it’s their vocation.

  “That’s right, you believe that while you’re all away,

  We’re just where you left us, doing nothing all day.”

  Could Do Better

  It’s the end of term and the school report

  Fills me with cynicism.

  In the olden days they’d tell you straight;

  Now it’s a euphemism.

  You’ve got to learn the secret code

  (They don’t want to contravene

  The Teachers’ Charter), so you must translate

  To know what they really mean.

  For example, they have to describe a child

  Even if they don’t know them from Adam.

  If your child is labelled a “natural leader”,

  That means they’re a right bossy madam.

  If they “contribute well to class discussion”,

  You mustn’t get cut up.

  If they’re “keen to share opinions”,

  It just means they won’t shut up.

  If your child is called “creative”,

  That just means they are a liar.

  If they’re “dynamic” and “independent”,

  Their concentration will be dire.

  If “active and enthusiastic”,

  Don’t expect a master’s degree;

  The letters that should go after their name

  Are probably ADHD.

  “Animated” means disruptive.

  A “solitary child” has nits.

  “Willing to help” can only describe

  A brown-noser, if truth permits.

  “A pleasure to teach” means no trouble.

  “Easily upset” means spoilt rotten.

  If they’ve “enjoyed the social side of school”,

  Class Clown is the name they have gotten.

  If he “enjoys all PE activities”,

  Then he’s deffo a violent thug.

  If she “expresses herself confidently”,

  She’s cheeky, a smartarse and smug.

  “Animated” equals disruptive.

  “Articulate” is quite a feat,

  But it doesn’t mean they’re good at art.

  “Enjoys working in teams” is
a cheat.

  If he “knows his own mind”, he is stubborn.

  “Polite” means his work’s not OK.

  “Shows interest in her environment”

  Means she looks out the window all day.

  But remember Winston Churchill,

  Whose report said he’d “no ambition”;

  When he grew up he certainly proved them all wrong…

  Do carry on this tradition.

  My Dad Is Sooo Embarrassing

  My dad is sooo embarrassing.

  He really is a fool.

  He’s just bought a Harley

  And he thinks that he is cool.

  He gets drunk with his sad friends

  And then they get all naughty.

  What makes me sick and shocked and shamed

  Is they’re all over forty.

  He was God’s gift to music,

  A rockstar, given the chance.

  But it’s a total killer

  If you ever see him dance.

  He also thinks he’s sexy

  And flirts with the au pair.

  I’ll never take a girlfriend home

  If my dad just might be there.

  His hair’s receding rapidly;

  It’s now just a massive parting.

  He combs it over from one side,

  A bit like Bobby Charlton.

  He also was a sportsman once

  And now he’s on my side.

  The touchline echoes with his yells

  And I just want to hide.

  He also thinks he’s funny

  And tells jokes to all my chums.

  He makes Sid James look classy

  With his jests of tits and bums.

  But once he was a teenager –

  Was a lad, back in his day.

  He must have cringed at my grandad

  In exactly the same way.

  We Have Ways of Making You Eat

  School rules are often stupid,

  To do with bells and pegs.

  Shirts must be tucked in trousers

  And socks cover half of your legs.

  But lunchtime brings The Great Escape.

  The Dining Hall is Colditz.

  The menu is from World War II

  And you cannot eat the old bits.

  There’s food you won’t find anywhere else:

  Spam fritters and school liver.

  And turkey twizzlers that made their name

  Because of Jamie O’liver.

  The dinner ladies patrol the scene

  With Gestapo-looking features.

  They’ll spot any food that’s left on your plate

  And report you to the teachers.

  So the people who are legends,

  And the ones who set you free,

  Are the Food Escape Committee;

  “F.E.C.” to you and me.

  We’re not talking here about everyday feats

  Like faking certain allergies.

  Or scraping eggs behind radiators

  And aversion to the calories.

  We’re talking total heroes here,

  The ones with real worth.

  The sort who’d dig the tunnels

  And then disperse the earth.

  Boys like “Goose” McGinty

  With a Brussels sprout in his locket.

  Or ones like “Mad Max” Redmond,

  Who hid bolognese in his pocket.

  Or Josh “White Laces” Russell

  With spaghetti in his shoes,

  And his pencil case containing

  Hidden beetroot for the loos.

  But the ultimate name we all revere,

  With his smuggling of fish pie,

  Was Ben “The Mole” Carruthers,

  Who hid the lot inside his tie.

  Never was so much smuggled out

  By the few who ate so little.

  They fought for menus “a la carte”

  And for doughnuts with jam in the middle.

  “We want puds with custard and cream.

  We want lychees rather than leeches.

  We know our expedience will improve ingredients

  And we’ll fight them on the peaches.”

  The Poetry Recitation

  My palms are sweaty, my mouth is dry.

  There is the stage. I ask myself why

  Do I have to do this? It’s not fair

  To force scared boys to read up there.

  Standing alone, when it’s your turn.

  No text to read, they make you learn.

  The first boy up is a nervous wreck,

  Just stood there on the burning deck.

  Parents to right of him. Parents to left of him.

  It’s all too much and the room starts to spin.

  The next boy comes on. Will he be all right?

  “Tyger! Tyger! burning bright…”

  “That’s much more like it,” the audience is thinking.

  The poor boy spots that his father is winking.

  His mum starts smiling and nudges his brother.

  “I did this at school,” says the amnesiac mother.

  “In fact, I’m sure that I won first prize.”

  Matilda told such dreadful lies.

  The next one’s modern and nobody knows it.

  They can’t comprehend but nobody shows it.

  They prefer verses they learnt as a child:

  Iambic pentameters, not text running wild.

  “Dulce et Decorum Est…”

  The old ones really are the best.

  I’m next.

  And I’m scared.

  There’s parents and teachers and sisters and brothers.

  The judge seems quite nice but then so did the others.

  They’re always just so damned condescending;

  They like your beginning but prefer your ending.

  “Kiddies and grown-ups too-oo-oo.”

  (I’m desperate for the loo-oo-oo.)

  I’m up on stage and I know I don’t know it.

  I can’t even remember the poem or poet.

  I’m unable to start - my mind is quite hollow.

  If I get the name then the rest just might follow.

  Was it Kipling (Rudyard) or Byron (George Gordon)?

  Was it T.S. Eliot or W.H. Auden?

  “I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky…”

  Or anywhere that is not here to just curl up and die.

  “In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree…”

  I’d rather be there than standing here or be anyone other than me.

  “Jellicle Cats are black and white, Jellicle Cats are rather small…”

  I’d take being a cat, a spayed one at that, anywhere but in this hall.

  Aaaaah.

  I remember.

  “The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

  The lowing herd winds slowly o’er the lea,

  The dum dum dum de dum de dum de dum.”

  I can’t believe that I don’t know line three…

  I struggle on and get through somehow.

  I’ve blown it but feel better now.

  My parents grin and stick thumbs in the air.

  Do they know nothing or do they not care?

  The judge will know and will be tougher.

  “Nul points” is the right score for a duffer.

  He’s very kind – a small white lie:

  He says the standard was quite high.

  “Horatius at the Bridge” he rated second.

  “Beans, Beans” had won (the whole crowd reckoned).

  The judge thought not and chose a child

  Who delivered, by rote, his Oscar Wilde.

  It’s all over. Home seems not far.

  The parents chat and won’t come to the car.

  “I thought you were great,” my friend’s mum utters.

  My dad just says he preferred the stutters.

  He also thinks I deserved a prize,

&nbs
p; Proving old age won’t make you wise.

  So just twelve months ‘til we go again.