The power of verse

Jamaica gave birth to reggae
the great musical genre of today
encapsulating the country's clear blue seas
and sky scraper coconut trees

Bob Marley's rasta communication
spoke to people of every nation
with a positive vibration
speaking the message of love and contemplation

Ours too is an optimistic missive
Be inclusive not dismissive
Use the power of verse
to improve our world and universe

Biscuit: Coconut Cookies
Taste test: 6 out of 10
Cost: 99p from Asda in Totton

Round Round Get A Round

We're sitting around
debating the Cadbury's Roundie
ideas are going round in circles
like a merry-go-round
we're on a poetry roundabout
with more letters than a postman's round
who's first to get a round in?
cups of tea all round
tick tock the hands keep moving round
we'll finish now, we've run a ground!

Biscuit: Cadbury's Roundies
Taste test: 8.5 out of 10
Cost: £1.99 for 5 from Waitrose in Lymington

Some People

This week we participated in a New Forest Arts Festival outdoor poetry workshop run by poet Mark Rutter.
Here's one of the poems we wrote, it's inspired by nature.

Some people get struck by lightning
Others are struck by its beauty
Some people are rash criticising nettles
Others enjoy a cup of healthy nettle tea
Some people despise arachnid beasts
Others know their webs catch insect feasts
Some people's eyes itch exposed to pollination
Others get that without it there would be no creation.

Summer Fantasy

Spirits lifted by the sun
Ice creams melting one by one
Cocktails chilling in that shade
I'll make you a lemonade
Lemon floating in my drink
In the sun, skin's all pink
Afternoon nap beneath palm trees
Night arrives with a cool breeze

Love is in the air
Everlasting euphoria everywhere
Memories to cherish over winter time
Oh we've had enough of this rhyme
Nothing is ever this sublime!

Biscuit: White chocolate and Sicilian Lemon all butter biscuits
Taste test: 8 out of 10
Cost: £1.75 from Waitrose in Portswood

Butter or Marge: The real deal or the substitute

Election time and the politicians are here,
Buttering us up with their smooth, slick talk.
They deserve less than a pat on the head.
They tell us we’ll be in Clover
And you butter believe them.


We need an Anchor in these troubled times,
A Stork to deliver the NHS,
But what we hear is a Lurpak of empty promises
And a Country Life of hunting foxes.


The media’s misinformation is like Flora,
Easily spread, or like Bertolli,
Olive oil on troubled waters.
But voting is a contract, for butter or worse.


These lines have been inspired
By a banana and butterscotch nationalist,
A chocolate chump and pecan Nuttall,
Who’s ginger and rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb.
Those politicians, they all take the buttery biscuit.