A wounded soldier

Luke, a boy aged four
Came racing through the door
An ice cream held on high
His eyes upon the sky
And not upon his speedy feet
And a slippery spot upon the concrete

So Luke went flying through the air
Mum and Dad could only stand and stare
He landed hard upon his arm
We thought he hadn’t come to too much harm
How wrong we were in retrospect
But not for a moment did we suspect

Two days passed in silent pain
We thought perhaps he had a sprain
But in the middle of the night
We had a horrible, awful fright
His arm had swelled to twice the size
It was time our diagnosis to revise

So Mum left the cricket at half time
Got her car out of a den of crime
Small boy was stowed inside
With a blanket, a story and a porcupine
We made it to Sunninghill ER
Had to double park the car

We rushed in and sat, and sat, and sat
We looked at this and we looked at that
There were no seats in the waiting room
So we sat in a corner made for a broom
To the sound of babies’ painful cries
Mothers with utter exhaustion in their eyes

Doctor Hutton called our names
He’s helped me out before, with older brother, James
Amidst the chaos he is a veritable angel of grace
Calm and sure and pleasant with a smile upon his face
From the moment that he entered, I knew it was OK
And Luke would climb the monkey bars again one day

Thanks to huge bills I now owe
Luke is confirmed as having a fractured elbow
His arm is hung up in a sling
To teach him that it not wise to take wing
When one is not a little bird
But a small boy with the last word

The Morning Show

I spent this morning at a radio station
For which I have the utmost admiration
Our client sponsors a stupid sports joke
Quipped by very funny oke
We trooped inside the little booth
And were rudely awakened to the truth
That as chilled out and cool as these guys appear
They’re fucking stressed out when they’re off air
Every single thing is timed to the second
And not as ad-libbed as I always reckoned
Every comment is a double entendre
I don’t know how they do this everyday
My head hurts from keeping track
Of one-liners that roll like water from a duck’s back
They get to work round about four
Imbibe two cups of coffee at the door
That’s round about the time I turn my head
And burrow deeply into my nice warm bed

The epic tale of the Pearson wedding

I packed the car and got ready to go
It was time to get the show on the road
Then the geyser blew up and flooded the house
I cajoled and I reasoned with my furious spouse
I called upon the emergency plumber
Who came over, checked it out and said, “What a bummer”
Marc, the spouse, said, “I’m not leaving today”
I said, “Over my dead body do we cancel this holiday”
By the time we left our nerves were frayed
Neither of us like to be delayed
We arrived in the dark to a mountain retreat
To relax, chill out and get something to eat
Chill out we did ‘cause it was Artically freezing
And I couldn’t stop constantly sneezing

We piled back into our poor old car
And followed the rising morning star
We bid civilisation goodbye
And rode off into the untamed Transkei
We passed a sign “133 curves to go”
They weren’t lying either, I happen to know
Each hairpin bend hid cows and lifestock
Enough bad driving to give a taxi driver a shock

Now nobody said the place was urban
Hell, if we’d wanted that we’d have gone to Durban
But nothing prepared me for a trip to the Spar
I’d say a euphemism would be bizarre
Think taxi drivers with trolleys instead
Aiming at your feet and attacking your head
It took years off my life – a bit near-death
With little space to even draw breath


We arrived relieved at Cremorne Estate
And the boys went off to buy some bait
Some stinky sardines that smelt totally rank
And we sat to fish on the riverbank
We sat and we sat and we sat some more
Who knew fishing could be such a bore
“Close you eyes, mom, I got a cool surprise!”
Can you guess? I got a fresh fish eye!

So the Lexi and I went off for a drink
Leaving the boys with the aroma of fish stink
An hour or two passed with no sign at all
When through the dusk came a clarion call
Which my instincts were to largely ignore
A small boy loomed through the gathering gloom
I felt the keen sense of impending doom
Small boy number 1 was coated in clay
Like some bad Just William cliché
I scrubbed him down stood him under the shower
Getting him clean took over an hour
Which left just the remains of his muddy shoes
Dirty footprints and the faint smell of ooze

By the time the bridal couple checked in
The groom’s mama had already complained of the din
From three small peeps who wake up with the birds
And cannot fathom how they could be heard
We popped open a beer, lit a big fire
And tried to escape the parental ire
Now Matt and Ross from the groom’s side
Had a cunning plan which allowed them to hide
From any unwanted social interaction
And avoid embroilment in any family faction
The bride’s brother avoided the whole situation
By taking his girlfriend off on vacation


Friends and family came for champagne
They came by plane and car and train
Seb and Claire left the London spring
To arrive in weather cold and raining
Sam’s US folks drove down in a manual car
When they’ve only driven an automatic so far
Bonnie and Russell arrived with flair
To find their room keys were not anywhere
Despite all Sam and Andrew’s fears
Their families happily cracked open some beers
And Seb caught a fish of which he was proud
And carried it around and around and around

We took our family to build castles in the sand
And passed an octopus from hand to hand
A herd of cows looked on in bovine bonhomie
As I tried not to shudder and stifled a scream
But Lexi and I spent a happy few hours
Building mermaids and crabs and fairy princess towers
The boys and their Dad found all kinds of stuff
Shells and pebbles and unidentifiable bits of fluff
It was about then that I became a believer
In what Sam refers to as Pondo fever
The complete lack of regard for the hours
A burning desire to stand still and smell the flowers
(Or in my case then be sent on a mission
To steal rosemary from behind the restaurant kitchen)

In flagrant disregard for the law
Which is anyway fatally flawed
We procured some crayfish fresh from the sea
Crawling around happy and free
They scuttled about the back of the car
Sending me running straight to the bar
The kids looked on in morbid fascination
As we drowned them in the kitchen basin
After asking our fellow wedding guests
Which cooking method would be best
Marc decided to surf the net
Looking for a better bet
It was pretty damn gross and made one hell of a mess
But they tasted divine I have to confess
Now Andrew’s method may have lacked class
He stuck a feeler right up its arse
But it certainly worked to remove all the poo
It was simple and effective, if unnaturally taboo

Now the wedding was a day away
And we’d done nothing but eat and play
So the men went off to cut down trees
To make the wedding setting pretty
Sam and I went off to some friends of her folks
Where they sat, drank beer and had a few smokes
But Sam was a bride on one hell of a mission
To conquer the overlocker her overriding ambition
It took a few goes, but soon she was sewing
And the pile of silken scarves was growing
By the time she was done she’d had enough
Of making small talk about all sorts of stuff
I’d said to Marc, “Don’t worry I call on my cell
To ask you fetch us once we’ve said farewell”
Sam suggested we walk down the road
As her patience was about to explode
So she picked her Samsonite suitcase and started to walk
That’s when we realised the cellphone did not work
Two white girls from Jozi out in the bush
The suitcase carried, dragged and pushed
We walked and we trudged about to give up
When at last the network signal went up
We made our distress call and sat where we stood
On a spot of sand and a piece of wood


As the sun laid down her weary head
I empathised and went to bed
At some point I thought I had a bad dream
About a fire and a shout and a piercing scream
Come morning a nightmare was not to blame
Sam’s honeymoon suite had gone up in flames
The room was gutted and white with ash
Lives had flashed before eyes in a dazzling splash
Thank heaven the dress was not in the room
Now the wedding was coming really really soon

On my way back from perusing the mayhem
A call came in that was really a gem
My humble abode back in Joburg city
Had been robbed leaving it pretty much empty
Okay, so that’s a bit of an over-exaggeration
But poetic licence is my vocation
Short of throwing myself off a cliff
I did the next best thing and rolled a big spliff

The day of the wedding dawned bright and clear
The bride then realised the moment was here
Worried that she might make a bolt
Along the beach like a galloping colt
The groom moved the wedding from four to three
Which left one hell of a job for me
And the two other bridesmaids to get the bride
Dressed, made up and into her ride
Thanks Mr Jack and Mr Cuervo
Without you we’d never been ready to go
Admittedly without you she
Wouldn’t have to run off to pee
Instead of walking down the aisle
Where the groom had been waiting for quite awhile


Now Scott acted as one would expect from a brother
Like a filial example of the classic den mother
God help Andrew if he ever makes Sam cry
Cause Scott would give him one hell of a black eye
Sam’s dad looked awfully cute
All decked out in monkey suit
Bonnie, the awesome mother of the bride
Stood beaming and filled with maternal pride

With the sea breaking upon the sand
The bride and groom at last held hands
The best men stood with their umbrellas
The groom was a truly lucky fella
The rain fell down like diamond dew
When he said to her, “I love you”
The vows took the spinster off of the shelf
And were quite nice if I say so myself
By then we were wet from top to toe
No bride was more keen to go
After a hot shower and jeans
And that bride type of gleam
Samantha Pearson seemed to shine
With a ring that said quite clearly, “Mine”

Seb, Claire and I made up the wedding bed
With a heart of flowers and petals up the steps
Claire hung a banner and a load of balloons
We put champagne and wedding cake into the room
It soon became abundantly known
That the wedded two wanted to be left alone
So we left them to their consummation
And went on with the wedding celebration


We left them at it and hit the road
Only 133 more curves to go
Now I’m back at work hard at the wheel
And have to admit I’m starting to feel
That a shack on the beach with a pencil to write
Could just be my ideal kind of life
Meanwhile Mrs. Pearson is having a swoon
Every couple of hours on her honeymoon