A collection of poems and other writings...

Wednesday 28 May 2014

Bill Osman - Human Cannonball

A true story...

Bill Osman
lives next door with
Saucy the Cat
and his wife.
He smiles at us 
as he clips the hedge.

Mrs Osman 
has a thin mouth.
She doesn't smile so much.
She keeps our football
in a box
when it goes over too often.

Saucy has fleas.
She comes through the hedge
by the bluebells
and poos
in the flower beds.

Bill Osman
 is a small, gentle man.

He was a sailor during
The War
doing Morse Code.

Dotdotdot

He was on a ship that got
torpedoed.

Dahdahdah 
Dotdotdot 

As it was sinking
Bill Osman 
jumped into the sea.

He bobbed about waiting for a rescue
but got caught in a current
and suddenly
he was being sucked
into a whirlpool
- the ship’s funnel sank beneath the waves,
the sea spiralling in
down a giant plughole.

Bill Osman
knew he was going to drown
as down and down he went…

But suddenly
there was a thunderclap
way below him.
Then there was 
a great roaring of water
and hissing of steam
and Bill Osman was flying up
through the air
up with the birds
wind in his hair
looking down at the sea below

The ship’s engines
had exploded 
and fired him out
like a human cannon ball

and now
he has landed
here
with Mrs Osman

and Saucy 
and her fleas.

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