Topical Acrostic Sonnets

 Going By The Book

 Get ready to return your books for free,
 On time or two years late—it matters not
 In York, because your city library
 Now caters to the absent-minded swot.
 Get ready to check out a few more vols
 Before you try to find what you mislaid:
 York's going by the book—new protocols
 Toss out all fees that once had to be paid ...
 However, even though you can't be fined,
 Each time your books are overdue, we will
 Be sure to let you know that you're behind
 On book returns. And, since you get no bill,
 Our hope is that your guilty conscience may
 Keep nagging—till you volunteer to pay!

 (First published in Light on 13th March, 2023 as
  one of the Poems of the Week. Story here)
 A God-Given Right

 A judge has ruled that if you are Canuck,
 God gave to you a fundamental right
 Of self-expression: use what rhymes with duck,
 Deployed with off. Although it's not polite,
 Good manners maketh not the man who gets
 Insulted by a neighbour with a grudge
 Vindictively repeating epithets
 Expressing scorn. According to the judge,
 No crime's committed if you flip the bird,
 Rebuffing smears. In all his decades while
 In court, no feebler case was ever heard:
 Good sense, he said, would see the case's file
 Hurled out the window—but, in Montreal,
 The courthouse has no windows, none at all!

 (First published in the New Verse News on
  1st April, 2023. Story here)
 A Wind Is Ill If It ...

 A wind is ill if it blows nothing good:
 While Paris turns its nose up at the stench
 In districts where its striking workers would
 Not gather garbage, legions of your French
 Drain-dwelling rats delight in rancid smells
 Inviting them to surface and find treats—
 Served up as haute cuisine at top hotels—
 In garbage bags piled high on Paris streets ...
 Lest you infer that only rats say "Bon!":
 Let's not forget, olfactory disgust
 Impels the chic to slap more perfume on,
 For days on end, so sales of perfume must
 Increase—perfumers too say "Bon!" in France.
 The wind's not ill if it brings some bonne chance!

 (First published on 27th March, 2023 in
  Oddball Magazine. Story here)
 The Perfect Pint

 To pour the perfect pint of beer, you need
 Heroic mental focus, nothing more:
 Electric signals from your cortex feed
 Perceptions of the pint you hope to pour,
 Encoded, to the reader of your mind—
 Robotic barman Homer, who works out,
 For you, how low the glass should be inclined,
 Exactly, and how fast the beer should spout,
 Correctly ... but beware of drinking late:
 The pint of bitter with a perfect head
 Pours only if you fully concentrate.
 If you're half-plastered when your mind is read,
 Neuronal signals from your EEG
 Turn beer to froth—and brew catastrophe!

 (First published in Light on 27th March, 2023 as
  one of the Poems of the Week. Story here)
 We'll Have A Blast

 Who cares if our first transport to the void
 Exploded? Did our SpaceX Starship not
 Lift off and leave the launch pad undestroyed,
 Log reams of data to discover what
 Half-sabotaged our maiden voyage, and
 Achieve a record size for upward bound
 Vehicular assemblies? Our unmanned
 Explorer's first success is on the ground ...
 As SpaceX engineers, we'll have a blast
 By blowing up expensive rockets to
 Learn what went wrong. Our mission will be classed
 A triumph since we'll know more than we knew.
 So we can't fail on practice trips to Mars—
 The secret to success is, set low bars!

 (First published on 24th April, 2023 in
  Oddball Magazine. Story here)
 Where's The Logic?

 When Cleethorpes' tide was low, detectorists
 Hung out and looked for treasure in the sand,
 Extracting coins for archaeologists'
 Researches. But their digging is now banned.
 Enthusiasts are puzzled by this move,
 Since little holes are classified as bad,
 Though bureaucrats are happy to approve
 Holes big enough to bury all your dad—
 Except his nose. How can a lesser pit
 Leave greater damage? Where's the logic for
 Officialdom that's willing to permit
 Great trenches but bans peepholes on the shore? ...
 Is metal buried somewhere not too deep
 Concealing secrets someone needs to keep?

 (First published in Light on 1st May, 2023 as
  one of the Poems of the Week. Story here)



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