National Poetry Day

Place-Names of China
Written by Alan Bennett

Bolding Vedas! Shanks New Nisa!
Trusty Lichfield swirls it down
To filter beds on Ruislip Marshes
From my lav in Kentish Town

The Burlington! The Rocheter!
Oh those names of childhood loos -
Nursie rattling at the door knob:
'Have you done your Number Twos?'

Lady typist - office party -
Golly! All that gassy beer!
Tripping home down Hendon Parkway
To her improved Windemere.

Here I sit, alone at sixty,
Bald and fat and full of sin,
Cold the seat and loud the cistern
As I read the Harpic tin.