Formal poetry

Richard Sharp

Likes to whinge and to carp

That report was bad luck

Now off he can fuck

To save the rivers

To pay for their survival

We must burst the banks

Give handouts to the City not the town
Award the top the most, the bottom least
and in the end, the wealth will trickle down

So feed the finest to the howling hound
The sparrow pecks the droppings of the beast
Give handouts to the City not the town

Allow some crumbs to tumble to the ground
Please overload the table for the feast 
and in the end, the wealth will trickle down

Autumn falls and storm clouds brew
The post each day brings season's chill
The queue moves on a step or two

The last demand is overdue
It stands unopened on the sill
As autumn falls and storm clouds brew

They stand in file to give their due
A strung-out wait to pay their bill
The queue moves on a step or two

Walk down locked and empty streets alone,
arrive for start of shift, it's bear-the-brunt time
to serve some others' families not your own
Going from the home front to the frontline

Frozen pay, now tiny, ice-cold 'offers', 
red-bordered bills alert approaching deadline
The firing line ignites key workers' coffers
Going from the frontline to the breadline

Jeremy Westlake

has the second best take

He's in charge of the cash

and makes sure he gets a big stash

Grant Shapps

He talks and he craps

But often gets confused

About which end he's used

• after Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley

A golden shovel based on the final stanza of The Mask of Anarchy by Percy Bysshe Shelley.

They hold us down but still we rise,
deference dies, we bite them down to size. Like
Jayaben roars, we are the lions,
Mr Manager, you'll do no more damage after
we've dealt with you. Stretching from slumber,

Flexing our muscle, exercising our minds, in
readiness for when they find that they are not unvanquishable
as they thought. They bought power but we have number.

Owen Patterson

takes envelopes with splatters on

One hundred grand and he'll do your bidding

Fit for public office? You've got to be kidding.