Poetry Sunday 9 December 2018

Posted on by

(Reposted from 22 November 2014, in anticipation of joyous summer visits from numerous relatives.)

LEOPOLD ALCOCKS
by
Jake Thackray

Leopold Alcocks, my distant relation,
Came to my flat for a brief visitation.
He’s been here since February, damn and blast him
My nerves and my furniture may not outlast him.

Leopold Alcocks is accident prone.
He’s lost my bath plug, he’s ruptured my telephone.
My antirrhinums, my motor bike, my sofa
There isn’t anything he can’t trip over.

As he roams through my rooms, all my pussycats scatter.
My statuettes tremble, then plummet, then shatter.
My table lamps tumble with grim regularity.
My cut glass has crumbled and so has my charity.

Leopold Alcocks, an uncanny creature
He can’t take tea without some misadventure:
He looks up from his tea cup with a smirk on his features
And a slice of my porcelain between his dentures.

He’s upset my goldfish, he’s jinxed my wisteria
My budgie’s gone broody, my tortoise has hysteria.
He cleans my tea pots, my saucepans, with Brasso
And leaves chocolate fingerprints on my Picasso.

Leopold Alcocks never known to fail
Working his way through my frail Chippendale.
One blow from his thighs (which are fearsomely strong)
Would easily fracture the wing of a swan.

I brought home my bird for some turkish moussaka
Up looms old Leopold I know when I’m knackered.
He spills the vino, the great eager beaver,
Drenching her jump suit and my joie de vivre.

Leopold Alcocks stirring my spleen
You are the grit in my life’s vaseline.
A pox on you Alcocks! You’ve been here since Feb’ry
Go home and leave me alone with my debris.

So Leopold Alcocks, my distant relation,
Has gone away home after his visitation.
I glimpsed him waving bye bye this last minute
Waving his hand with my door knob still in it.

Notes by our celebrated Poetry Editor, Ira Maine

This chap was a singer in the French style around English clubs in the seventies. I went to see him on more than one occasion. His songs were not to everybody’s taste so he never commanded a huge audience. Sadly, later on as tastes changed his audiences dwindled even more. The poor chap became increasingly depressed and eventually took his own life.

His style is based on that of Georges Bresson, famous in France where the habit of singing in clubs, cafes and bars is well established and has produced people like Piaf, Yves Montand, Petula Clark, Charles Aznavour and countless others..A similar culture does not exist in the UK, largely because of the draconian licensing laws which denied cafes and coffee shops, until very recently, the right to sell alcohol. This suited the pub owners very well. If people wanted a drink outside of their own home they had no choice but to go to the pub.This was a very effective way of utterly warping the average persons attitude to alcohol. Cafes are for mixed company socializing; pubs are places where men go to get drunk.. 

I find this poem/song very amusing and typical of Jake.
I’m beginning to feel that perhaps we’ve done this poem sometime ago…and I’m repeating myself… to hell with it…