It's Dark Satire
Submitted by Janine on
Iain Duncan Smith
Is donating sugar
Irony dies, suffocating
In demonic smile
My Poems
Having written and performed as The Big J in the 1980s, Janine started again in 2014, after a brief interlude of around a quarter of a century.
Froms sonnets to villanelles, limericks to ballads, the occasional rap and plenty of straightforward rants, serious and humorous and sometimes both, here is Janine's verse.
Janine's poems have been published in numerous poetry and other journals and websites, including Algebra of Owls, South Bank Poetry, the Daily Mirror, PUSH, Hour of Writes, Proletarian Poetry, Confluence Medway, Screaming Violets, Poetry24, Solidarity, Stand Up and Spit, Hastings Independent, Freedom, Women’s Fightback, the Morning Star, Rising and TenFootCity; and in anthologies Spies4Life, Poems for Jeremy Corbyn, Justice: Poems for Grenfell Tower.and Ashes to Activists
31 January 1919: Reading the Riot Act
Submitted by Janine on
An historical anecdote from the Clydeside General Strike of 1919 (pictured)
In George Square in Glasgow
in Nineteen-nineteen
Sixty thousand red rebels
are striking a scene
The sheriff takes stage
to proclaim the King's words
Required by the Riot Act
order: Disperse!
By Royal decree
clear the square in an hour
On pain of a pounding
of military power
Masterless Men
Submitted by Janine on
After the Battle of Waterloo, the British ruling class got in a bit of a panic about unemployed ex-servicemen roaming the country, worried that these 'masterless men' would cause trouble. A similar fear haunted Lloyd George's Liberal-Tory coalition government after the end of the war a century ago.
The masterless men
strike cold fear in the soul
of the masters resolved
that they stay in control
Genuine Question
Submitted by Janine on
Why do you have to write 'genuine question' to indicate that you are asking a genuine question?
Genuine question.
Why is it not assumed that your question is genuine unless you indicate otherwise?
Genuine question.
Who Do You Blame?
Submitted by Janine on
Those who fought it
or those who caused it?
Those who saved sixty-five
or those who cost seventy-two?
Those who did not know the tower was clad in torchwood
or those who chose that cladding because it was cheaper?
Those whose chosen job is to walk into burning buildings to save life
or those whose careers are built on making money by cutting corners?
Menopausal Dryness
Submitted by Janine on
More intimate with
Intimate moisturiser
Than I'd like to be
No Hope for Chope
Submitted by Janine on
I fancied some titilating photos
so I went on an upskirting hunt
I didn't really care about consent,
that's if I'm being blunt
I came across Sir Christopher
and thought I'd have a punt
I'd capture a peek of his private parts,
I'd chortle and I'd grunt
It seemed to me a great idea,
a harmless and witty stunt
But what was the image my camera showed?
The Joker and the Trump
Submitted by Janine on
Boris Johnson nominates
the President of the United States
He says the Nobel Prize for Peace
should go to Donald Trump
But that joker has been played before
No satire in it any more
Irony died, doesn't he see?
when Kissinger won it in seventy-three
Lives Shortened
Submitted by Janine on
Sorry?
Is
Jeremy Hunt
for real?
Up to 270 dead is
the toll of that 'glitch'
That is
Hundreds of women gone
unscanned, untreated
Hundreds of women gone
That is
the toll of that 'glitch'
Up to 270 dead is
for real.
Jeremy Hunt
is
sorry.
A Bad Night for Ashleigh
Submitted by Janine on
Hi there, it's Ashleigh
from the Daily Mail
I've smelled a story
I'm on the trail
I want to sound street
and your tweets are sick, mate
I'm getting desperate
for some clickbait
Hi there, it's Ashleigh -
you're at the scene
I'm in my office
and I'm really keen
To get a tasty
stabbing quote
About some feral,
lowlife scroat
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