Captain Camel & the Band of Hope
Memories of Bordeaux last year. I feel the need to go again:
Captain Camel and the Band of Hope
Captain Camel and sweet Alabaster
pedalled for all they were worth.
Twisting tightly the rubber rope
that would take us from the earth.
This rubber band, the band of hope,
twitched and twanged 'til taut.
Joystick hoofed, and a plume of smoke,
My baby be good to us.
Poets quivered into their seats,
tense and pale and fraught.
Shuddering forward at stupid-o-clock
La Manche was hopped with aplomb.
There were actresses abounding
and bishops all about, but the
tall guy is at twelve right now
and the fat girl's right on eight.
We were strong armed round the city
by the sum son Church of Christ.
Past the black burned Jeanne
astride her mighty mount.
Not long into the foreign field
Makin beaucoup de pluie d'or
I'm struck with Bury Beret
like a spanner in the legs.
Shorn and shriven caverners
of Cambridge pale hue.
Quake to hear the thunder
of the Wolers in full flow.
Drink wine
drunk whine.
Great Scot, les rosbif ravagers
of the ranting poa tribe,
have thrown the bebe
to the ground in their crush
to get the booze.
We crossed the river Jordan
to two horses draped with grape.
One hoarse and happy picnic
in the stables of the mad.
My aunt's old pen of whitest stone
such fluent notes performs.
The Anarking of Poetland
struck les grenuilles blind.
Kneel o' subjects for these gems,
put a feather in your hats.
For some the colour's purple,
and Mamie knows that best,
For those of us just feeling blue,
the darkest shade shines out.
The headache and the ragged throat,
safely packed and stowed.
The tall guy ticked to twelve again
and we were put to flight.
Malcolm Saunders
Sat 1st Mar 2008 10:00
Hi Clarissa
I am afraid it would take a small book to explain it properly. It is rather an in joke aimed at those who went on the trip. Sorry about that. It was not at all exotic actually, just a short visit to Bordeaux in France where a dozen drunken British poets rolled around the city for a few days talking rubbish, getting lost and showing off as poets do.
Just a few little translations:
Camel - pure fantasy pilot
My baby - BMI Baby airline
Alabaster - pretty poet and fine musician Alabaster de Plume
Stupid-o-clock - four in the morning
La Manche - The English Channel to us. (Everything in the world is English or British)
What the actress said to the bishop - conversation laden with innuendo.
Tall Guy and Fat Girl - the hands on Gemma's watch.
Strong armed & church of christ - John Armstrong, maths graduate of Christchurch College, Oxford and our trip organiser.
Black burned Jeanne - French heroine Joan of Arc burned by the British for being too like a man.
pluie d'or - golden rain - pee
Bury beret - beri beri - disease of malnutrition - Gemma from Bury wearing a beret - alcoholics get malnutrition - Gemma doesn't drink.
Spanner in the legs - legless drunks - line from Gemma's poem
Shorn and shriven caverners - allusion to poet Sean Kavanagh.
Cambridge - English pub in Bordeaux - host to La Poesie.
Rosbif - French term for the English
Poa Tribe - reference to powerful performance poem by Scott Devon.
Bebe thrown to ground - some drunken discussion in the pub about another of Gemma's poems & the extreme height difference between Scott & Gemma.
River Jordan and 2 horses refers to Julian Jordan and his Citroen 2CV car. The grape and picnic relate to an eccentric French psychologist and his garage of 2CV's variously decorated as grape fields, fish bowls, etc.
Aunt's old pen - Alabaster again
Anarking - Paul Blackburn - the anarchist King of Poetryland
les grenoulles - the frogs - affectionately insulting English term for the French
feathers and gems refers to Alabaster and Gemma. Hues of blue are about the colours of Oxford and Cambridge universities. Oxford is dark blue. John and I went to Oxford and the pub is the Cambridge.
Then the hungover trip home when Gemma's tall guy indicates.
There you go. I think I missed some out, but I am exhausted now.