Competition
IN COMPETITION No 239, you were invited to write a poem called The Exhibition. Art pseuds came in for some mockery, and the narrator in Mary Hodge’s entry even laid into Miss White at the primary school for allowing inaccurate representations of Mum and Dad. D Shepherd ingeniously told of the exhibition of C A Parsons’s steam turbine ship Turbinia at the Spithead Review of 1897. Sheila Clark told of the purchase of a Beatty washing machine exhibited at Crystal Palace in 1935, the engine of which lasted 70 years. What don’t you readers know? Congratulations to those printed below, each of whom wins £25, with The Chambers Dictionary of Great Quotations going to Sue May.
I went to the diane arbus show (in lower case, as you should know). She documented circus freaks, And drag artistes and teenage geeks. In New York City she took snaps of Siamese twins and folks with maps inked on their skin and placid stares, and the Backwards man, who lived upstairs. (His shoes point the other way to his face, the creepiest photo in the place). Her images are stark and frank; there’s nudists, midgets, maniacs. The Exhibition was disarming, humane and curious and charming. Susan May
The Grand Exhibition of 1848 Had the world all a-quiver and agog. The venue walls shimmered with polished silver plate, Rising up from an uninspired bog.
Inside there were paintings of Air and of Earth; A live dandy, dressed in silk, in a cage. In a curtained-off oasis, humpbacks giving birth While a shaman chanted songs and smouldered sage.
They’d shipped in a rainforest, complete with the rain, And a glacier on the backs of five geese. A mother-of-pearl chamber held sparks of pure pain; Guests cried, “Will these wonders never cease?”
But the Fountain of Mercury has long since dried up, And the sand eels ate away the silver plate. The dandy escaped, and stole the calf-skull cup, Leaving the humpbacks, and the shaman, to their fate. Robert Best
Box-ticking tourists, footsore and bored, Getting their money’s worth, here from abroad, Bedsitter tenants in to keep warm Feigning an interest in colour and form, Frankly pretentious show-offs to girls Here for free entrance, swine viewing pearls, Knowledgeable matrons, always in pairs – The openly cruising, the lonely, bereft Staying, till closing time, only ones left, Genuine art lovers quietly intent On glorious paintings, for whom they were meant, Me, sans umbrella, caught on the hop Ignoramus and heading straight for the shop: Seen by attendants every weekend, a crowd of ‘art lovers’ with different agenda. Dorothy Pope
No catalogue available, of course, Or needed as, gobsmacked, I wonder round The garden for an exclusive viewing Of at least a handful of master-works
A pair of dartboards, a fair trampoline, Net curtains hanging from the washing-line A decorated swing and a fellow Ensconced within circles of dew, waiting.
After tea and toast and the News at Ten, I’m back for more. But the show is over. Wound up? Stolen by the sun? Search me, guv But it’s gone. The whole collection – vanished!
The artists, too, or so it seems, until I spot one under the roof of the swing, Spinning away, making a whole new start, To lust of his predatory, spider heart! I White
COMPETITION No 241 I was annoyed to have no pound coin left for the supermarket trolley the other day. A poem, please, called Change, in any sense. Maximum 16 lines. Entries, by post (The Oldie, Moray House, 23/31 Great Titchfield Street, London W1W 7PA) or email (comps@theoldie.co.uk - don’t forget to include your postal address), to ‘Competition No 241’ by 25th April.