February 19, 2006
Sad Aunt Marge:
As the cold winter evenings drew near
Aunt Marge used to put extra blankets
over the furniture, to keep it warm and cosy
Mussolini was her lover, and life
was an outoffocus rosy-tinted spectaclebut neurological experts
with kind blueeyes
and gentle voices
small white hands
and large Rolls Royces
said that electric shock treatment
should do the trick
it did...today after 15 years of therapeutic tears
and an awful lot of ratepayers' shillings
down the hospital meter
sad Aunt Marge
no longer tucks up the furniture
before kissing it goodnight
and admits
that her affair with Mussolini
clearly was not right
particularly in the light
of her recently announced engagement
to the late pope.
'Sad Aunt Marge' by poet Roger McGough, from his book Blazing Fruit: Selected Poems 1967-1987 (ISBN 0140586520).
