John Greeves
The History Teacher
(After Billy Collins)
To protect his students’ innocence,
he tells them the ice age was really
the Chilled Age before greenhouse gases,
a period where people wore animal skins to cover
up political incorrectness.
The Stone Age, was indeed the rock age,
people dropped out, turned on and tuned in,
had long hair, wore miniature cow bells,
advocated flower power, travelled to San Francisco,
sought love and peace from the barrel of a gun.
The Iron Age (Satanic mills) was grimmer,
born in Sheffield amongst forks, knives and spoons
it revolutionised eating habits, table etiquette,
convenience meals, working patterns, unsocial shifts;
and severed men from wives in this new Jerusalem.
The Dark Ages [summer pillaging (seasonal only)],
came before electricity, political parties, rhetoric
factual accuracy, chronology, duck houses,
axe-bladed politicians, credit crunched bankers and turbo-consume
The Tudor Age (Not smelling of Stone Roses),
encompassed births, marriages and death, intrigue and religion
cardinal duplicity, chopping boards and Henry’s royal deceit.
The technological age, well... he hesitates
provided the world with mobile phones,
the Internet, Sat Nav., global communications,
(glancing at his watch),
an inability to talk further about...
Page(s) 16
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The