Ballad of the Londoner


On the tube this week, I read one of the Poems on the Underground stuck on a poster in the carriage. It was called Ballad of the Londoner by Flecker and you can read it here. It was good, it was old but it wasn’t relevant any more. So I thought I’d put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard) and write one myself. It’s called:

Ballad of the Londoner (2007), With Apologies to the Flecker Fella.

In the Piccadilly Line carriage
Where I’m sat
I can’t tell if that woman is just fat
Or heavily pregnant and in need of my seat
For which I’d happily stand
To my destination
Final station
As long as I don’t get
Mugged or bombed
Or make eye contact with anyone

Comments

Anonymous said…
Oh fantastic. There is a joke that says something like better stay in your seat than to upset a fat lass. (And I should know!)
2:11 PM
Glenda Young said…
Linda, but once I stared long and hard at a woman's tum and figured she was just fat only to find out she was pregnant, heavily, when she sat down next to me when someone got off. I felt really guilty!
5:46 PM
Unknown said…
I once saw a poem scrawled on a bus shelter in my home town, Nanpantan:

Last week I tried to kill myself;
Last night I told my father:
"Last week I tried to kill myself."
He simply said: "Try harder"

I blame the Sixties.
12:26 AM
Old Cheeser said…
Nice poem, Nora.

I wrote a poem about being on the tube once. Wish I still had it. But I can remember the opening bit:

The tube's a headf&ck
It's crowded and hot
Aggression, pushing, shoving
Rudeness, sweat, snot.

Nice eh? A tad negative too I suppose, written when I was less enamoured with LU. Maybe I should finish it off.
8:12 PM
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