This month's poem was chosen by Elvis McGonagall who says of it, "In the wake of yet another Red Nose marathon in March of this year and the subsequent news that erstwhile portly tunesmith Gary Barlow allegedly booked a private jet at a cost of 50 grand to fly his celebrity chums back home after their tireless fundraising up Kilimanjaro (why was Chris Moyles allowed to come back down?), this poem deals fearlessly with the tricky subject of participation in large scale charity initiatives. Indeed it is a timely, nay searing, analysis of the less well known but equally invasive Lady of Shalott Day. Note the reference in the last line to Phillip Schofield but no mention of Fern Britton. Poignant. Tirra lira indeed."

You can find out more about Rachel and her work at:  http://www.writeoutloud.net/poets/rachelpantechnicon

 LADY OF SHALOTT DAY

Don’t you hate it when it’s Lady of Shalott Day?
Don’t you don’t you?

Tirra lira tirra lira
goes the alarm on my bedside cabinet
and here’s one problem that can’t be solved
by reaching out and grabbing it -
because today is Lady of Shalott Day,
only once a year,
when you have to go into work in all your Lady of Shalott gear
and if you forget and wear your cardigan and your pop-socks
you have to put some money in the Lady of Shalott box.
And there’s Derek from Wages in his armour and his stupid plume
making a tapestry of the timesheets in the next-door room;
and it’s rosemary for remembrance
a pomegranate in your sandwich-box
when all you want’s a Penguin biscuit
but you daren’t risk it, not at all.
And meanwhile in the typing-pool
we’re not allowed to look directly at our typewriter keys -
the Qs the Ws the Es the Rs the Ts -
we have to look at them in a mirror;
and it’s rosemary for remembrance Tippex for typing-errors.
And we’re not allowed to look directly at the window-cleaner
cleaning windows leaning on a major supporting pillar
with his little ukulele singing Tirra lira
and his Lonsdale sweatshirt reading Eladsnol.

But it’s nice when you go home for a shower
where a shower-curtain hangs aslant the bath
and the eight-hour Shalottathon is on
with Philip Schofield as King Arth