Fenland Sketch
4

The editor of Island (Scotland) kindly published Fenland Sketch 1 in the November 2001 edition. Whilst commenting on that poem, he wrote that if his neighbour’s God was watching him, he’d bugger a goat on the front lawn.

I thank you for your note, in which you write
about the acts you threaten in a bum
caprine. I didn’t say (I’d thought it trite)
that I’m a secret agent for The Scum,

for which I dig in bins throughout the night
(I raid the rich and famous) looking for
hysteria to push in black and white.
To you, I shall admit, I’ve been a bore,

I told my editor the things you say,
I rue my lack of nous. He’s sent a clan
of journalist to hunt around your neigh–
bourhood; he hopes to find a fan of Man–

chester United (we’ve got Beckham un–
der contract). If you wake to see, one day,
a chamoise sweetly tempting in the sun,
resist that goat, for David B, your neigh–

bour’s football God, awaits, binoculars
in hand, to watch. The cameraman will flash
and snap, the journalist will crawl the bars,
pretending he was there. A grand, in cash,

will cheer your neighbour’s life, and you’d go in
a chat show agent list of guests, so low
that all the coucherati sneer your sin;
hypocrisy is good TV, you know.

Of course, I don’t expect all this to make
a difference, to wit, your acumen
in publishing my works. I’ll have my cake
and scoff it, for your moment in The Scum.