Untitled

Imbedded in a sky of lead

a giant's mumble

a giant's treat

a giant's angry grumble;

Clashes!

As night descends

the sky lit up by angry flashes

...upends

War Games. GAMES?

Rehearsals for

another war

Noisy choppers, low flying jets

Outrageously increase the nation's debts

Battle stations feed no starving third world.

HWS

Invocation at Midnight

Twelve o'clock!

Clock! Note carefully the hour!

The Devil's horsed upon us now.

Ride Red, ride!

Trumpets!

Sound the chase! Speak!

Speak, mouths of brass, bay us the moon,

Earth's dark satellite.

Clarinet!

You of the slender throat there, play!

Play Pipes of Pan!

Saxes, drums, guitars, all of you, all, all together now

For us to dance.

Dance? Dance?

You've got ants in your pants, boy!

Here, you! Charlie! for chrissakes! Another drink before we die!

HWS 1943

Untitled

The affluent effluent 400 stand or stood

for neither evil of for good

but having reached a certain state of grace

infest the place

command its heights

overlook its most attractive sights.

The working class for them is trash

to be bought & sold for cash

but never more than can be spared

lest wealthy pleasures be impaired.

With what repulsive greed

they buy the many things they do not need

oil and diamonds, furs and spice

these lice

their baleful faces

turning up in all

the world's most sheltered places.

HWS

Untitled

Skin-tight jeans & satin evening gowns reveal

precisely what we wish they would conceal;

BLATANT BUTTOCKS! BORING BUMS!

the-all-too-human ass behind, while at the fore

protuberances that we abhor.

PUBLIC PILLOWS! PELVIC LUMPS!

padded out we may suspect

for provocative effect.

& what about those mammary mounds

that Maidenform pretends to keep in bounds,

the ghastly fissure

we are forced to contemplate at leisure,

the nipples node

obscenely peeping out from modesty's abode.

OH! for the days of Quakerish restraint

eye-shadow OUT, no garish paint

whalebone, worsted & blue serge

defied the bestial urge.

HWS c.1980

Untitled

Well within the time allowed

anger altered, mater plowed

All the honey-covered pills are taken

trees that bear no fruit are shaken

BLAST THE BOOBIES, bill the brats

moss-grown monkeys, mildewed cats

Must we murder mater's mummy?

tie her tubes and slit her tummy?

Vend the vulva, flog the Volvo

you won't be paid to kill the Dodo.

HWS 1984

Life & Death on a Devonshire Pond

Where insects breed

Wagtails walk on floating rafts of weed

and feed

Mindful of the inlets nutrient flow

trout patrol the depths below

rise to gobble flies unwary

themselves to be the wachtful heron's quarry.

HWS 1986

To Tom Ingram Who Loves These Fields so Much

Beneath a cloudless sky

an hundred acre field defies the eye;

so yellow that it seems it must contain

some laboratorial stain, some man-made dye.

Cadmium? Chrome? No bovine piss

produces colour such as this!

"Mad" Vincent would indeed go mad

to sort out from his box a tube

from which such a pigment would exude.

Mustard? Rape?

Amid its saffron blooms a myriad tiny beetles toil.

The farmer meanwhile thinks of plasters, sandwhich spread

and oil

HWS 1992

Alphabetical Doggerel

A is for aardvark

B is for bump

C is for cock-up

D is for dump

E is for effluent

F is for frump

G is for gastric

H is for hump

I is for inmate

J is for jump

K is for knockneed

L is for lumps

N is for nackered

M is for mumps

O is for offal

P is for plump

Q is for quagmire

R is for rump

S is for sordid

T is for thump

U is for upchuck

VD

WC

XYZ

HWS 1999

Untitled

As we descend into the darkness

I can still see you.

In the last sunbeam, a fragment of broken glass

I am leading or are you?

Fax me a kiss.

HWS