Lost for words, they're burning the books

Salisbury plain in the rain

And the foreign hoards

The hair dresser in a Salon

One of Seventeen

They were different there

They told her she talked too fast

She needed to slow down

I asked her if she knew any blacksmiths

No

There weren't so many horses in Salisbury I concluded

The conversation 

Began to feel awkward

Though perhaps that was started when I tried to pay

With a fire damaged book

I mean barren down

That's where I found it

And I didn't want to go

in there empty handed

She was sweeping up human hair

and I was dropping charred words

And paper on her floor

From Collins 500 word search puzzles

I like the idea that the word search survived the fire

So that when we are lost for words

At all the devastation in life

We can keep searching for them

And eventually we might solve the puzzle

I hobbled back into the rain on my crutches

and got the twelve pounds out the bank

To pay the nice hair dresser lady

She told me the bull dog statue was for the Bath and West

The fire, I didn't see it

Only the black singed earth

The smouldering and then the smell of sulphur

Addictive somehow

Barren Down

A Barrow

The dead may now be cremated as well as buried

And you can see the Glastonbury Tor

It is torn from Autumn brown

They're burning books in Shepton Mallet

The fosse way

They are turning the pages

of history black

They're making a stink

Painting it pink

And the Goblins are wanting it back

The green fingers 

Of book worms

The witches are running in turns

Hailing the flax

Railing the haystacks

Smoking like chimneys in packs

They are burning the books

In Shepton Mallet

But don't tell them

They can't read them

Their libraries closed

And the Filo fax

Is out of order in poets corner

And I'm having one of my attacks

Roman Roads 

All along the spine of hills

Open and close like chapters

Read in geological time

Strata of line and verse of rock

The meter and rhyme

of ticking geo clocks

But the stage coaches rolled on it

Reading between the lines

The wrong side of the tracks

Came from the Frome side

All roads lead there perhaps

And maybe they paid in kind

In book bind, double blind

On the summit of knowledge

When you know it all

You find out you know nothing

So Burn your books by the pallet

Burn them in Shepton Mallet

Burn them tooth and nail

I'll go over with a fine tooth comb

To find these lost words

In the ashes of Canard's Grave

Hair raising

 Though in some its elastic

In others it's like plastic

The quality, the quality of hair is not strained

Some are like the hairy apes

Who in the forest reign

The quality, the quality of hair is not strained

You  may be a lion shaking off your mane

The quality , the quality of hair is not strained

Or perhaps you're a tiger swishing stripes in rain

It comes in all different colours and you'll know they're not the same

The quality, the quality of hair is not strained

Think of the mole, his skin it is quite strange,

You see him underground with black or brown mane

You think he is a man who walks about the town

But the quality, the quality of his hair is not strained

No don't find it yesterday

Don't look in your brush today

We leave our hair in every place

The quality's not strained

Though some hair is grey, some white or even beige

The blonde, the red, the brunette's head

The quality of hair is not strained

I once knew a moustached man

Who claimed his hair came from Japan

He asked them to pay for it

The quality is not strained

Then I saw a whaler's back

And nearly had a heart attack

The quality, the quality of hair is not strained

They gave him back his hair,

And he gave them back their swear

So now the Japanese can swear

With the best of the hairless brain

Oh the quality of hair, the quality of hair

The quality of hair, is not strained at all

No don't you ask me yesterday

What today I will pay

for just one hair upon your head

The quality's not strained

Don't you need me to reneg

On the wishes of your own egghead

They told me that it's not said

The quality is not strained

The quality of hair is not strained.

Draft and the tribes of Tumbleweed

And pubic hair begat Hairball
And Hairball joined with Bedding-Fluff
And together they brought forth Fluff-ball
Fluff-ball begat Tumbleweed
And tumbleweed did blow into the dark desert lands
Under the bed where he lived for many years
An Ascetic existence
Until the tribe of dustpan went searching him out
And war did Dustpan make on Tumbleweed
So That Tumbleweed
Became greatly diminished in both tumble
And weed, but was still at essence tumble weed
And so He rolled into Corner lands
Of Skirting board mountain ranges
There ravaged by many a storm sent by
Open Window, to punish him for not
Hiding himself well enough in the desert
No, nor was he spiritually rich
So that he must suffer more hardship
Until he learnt to Obey the law of Draft
Draft coming and going at night
Mysteriously
The Draft works in Mysterious ways it is
Oft said
Here Tumbleweed did grow strong again
And gathered around him others of closely related
Though Distinctly Different families
That did help him multiply
And increase in number, such that soon
Tumbleweed became King of the Corner lands
And did set his face against the tribes of Dustpan
Most stoic like and fierce was he in his demeanor
That some thought true madness reigned in the kings head
But after many wars were won, and the tribes of tumbleweed
Had multiplied again and again
So that Tumble weed begat beard shavings
And Beard-shavings begat nose-clippings
All were said to be Magnificent warriors
And did battle against broom, and brush

But then in the cities of dust and lice
Such licentious behaviour could be witnessed
That lo, see the Tribes of Tumbleweed have lost their way
As one Soothsayer Dinner-droppings was heard to say
And the mighty Draft shall smite them down
But nobody in town did listen to poor Dinner-Droppings
And on one awful day
He himself was wiped out and smeared across flooring lands
By Slipper-sole
So Draft, much angered now that his prophet whom he sent
From up high Dinner Plate
Had been ignored by Tumble Weed City
Sent forth his mighty Weapon, and brought forth his Vengeance
Upon them In a double Whammy of Biblical proportions
First the Doors of Heaven Did open
And a mighty Engine of Draft Breath did breathe
But like unto a dragon with red body and neck of most
Monstrous long length
And at its mouth it breathed not fire
But sucked up Air
In epic proportions such that few of the city escaped its voluminous belly
There was much Gnashing of teeth,
And grinding of wheels, as it is wrote in the book of Henry Hoover
Who recorded Draft's avenging Angel with like name

And it raged like thunder sound rolling all around the mountains
Of Corner land and did decimate Tumbleweed's golden city
Where they had lost their way and worshipped the Filth and Lice
 Of this place instead of the true word of Draft

And after this those who did remain
Fled into the desert lands again under the Bed
To live meagerly for many a season until
They could once again earn good favour with Draft