The Unlucky Number + We All Eat Food + Hell Is A Grave Yard (Photo)

A photograph shows 12 horseshoes on a farm wall. Each one is turned the right way up for luck and 12 according to a scant scan of google is a most fortunate number. Not in this poem and not in the writers mind who knows the 1 for January is 1 the worse and 1 the cursed.

The Unlucky Number

A damned twelfth month surrounded by darkness
Offers up the hope of winter solstice
The coming of longer days and sunlight
But January holds a look of doom

Born no doubt in stiffening November
Where bodies pile up on pyres burning
Guy Fawkes we still have this government and
A damned twelfth month surrounded by darkness

These numbers too big for the Exchequer
Which like Whitty and Vallance likes a graph
Of mountains going up as we go down
Offering up hope of winter solstice

Richard Downes
The shortest of days, four before christmas
The word of Boris is go, celebrate
Fornicate, transmission is everywhere
But here comes those longer days and sunlight

Their lives’ are going out on the front line
Where twelve days for twelve apostles and Christ
Turn to five, then one for stuffing turkeys
And January holds a look of doom

Richard Downes
22^nd January 2021
(From the Photo series)

This from a letter I sent to someone regarding a cd they’d sent me for xmas. “I am listening to your xmas jazz delight and inspired by one title in particular am writing a poem using all titles on this cd.. Enjoy”.

We All Eat Food

Whilst Eating An Umber Coloured Fish
I was gutted, beheaded and finished
Hung out to dry in the local smoke hole

She found a Cuttlefish on the seashore
Took it home for her budgie Pretty Polly
Whilst eating an umber coloured fish

Don’t ask for money, Don’t Ask (me) For Bread
I have no compassion left in my sole
I’ve been gutted, beheaded and finished

Behind french bistro Tantaratana
Where I was hanging five feet from the ground
Hung out to dry in the local smoke hole

Don’t ask me Brother Can You Spare A Dime
Fish don’t have pockets, we shouldn’t talk back
We get taken home to Pretty Polly

Served up on a platter like Jelly Roll
Gutted, beheaded, left witih no soul
So no brother I cannot spare you a dime

The Farmers Arms next to the french bistro
With a jukebox. I know what I would love to play
If fish had pockets and could press play that

I heard Simon and Garfunkel gigged there
Played their topmost songs like Scarborough Fair
Before I was fed to Pretty Polly

Chopped up, softened with butter, turned to Mash
Served just right with organic wholemeal bread
An umber coloured fish now being fed

To the finest fine dining Partisans
Licking their lips to savour the next bite
Chopped up, softened with butter, turned to mash

Dreams of Benidorm Motorway Services
I would have loved to have been eaten there
Served just right with organic wholemeal bread

Followed up with biscuits from Cookiegate
My sweet dreams are made of this treacle cake
An umber coloured fish now being fed

I taste so good served with madeira wine
The Breton waiter knows this is Tip One
Best for me too when not fed to that bird

But Pretty Polly and the Partisans
Are all included as We All Eat Food
Its the same for umber coloured fish

Richard Downes
24th January 2021
(From the 100 Meters series)