Cereal Cement

I like nonsense verse. Or just verse that makes you laugh.

Spike Milligan, Roald Dahl, Lewis Carroll, Roger McGough.

There is a fine British (and Irish, in Spike's case) of writing poetry about really very silly things because we can.

I am also conscious of the fact that I brim with ideas and that they float away from me often like cobwebs in the wind. It is frustrating and annoying but I cannot just sit and write whenever I want and so, my time constraints act like a sieve - some ideas are caught; some leave, wafting away, on the wind of missed opportunities, never to be fulfilled.

Today, I was washing up when I thought, as I have many times before, about the way that cereal, unless you are swift, will adhere to an eating receptacle and will refuse to be removed easily. Potato has similar properties but does not feature here unfortunately.

My mind was drawn while my hands were busy to thinking, once more, about how the strength of cereal is one of Nature's wonders that has potential but we have not chosen to harness it yet other than for the nutritional benefit. In this poem, I discuss its other less obvious positive attributes whilst also presenting a pair of case studies where its use may not have produced the best results.

Just a little fun.

****************

I find my mind is wandering as I do the washing up;

My stare is blank, my face is still: I swill another cup.

It's not a task that I enjoy; it really is a chore.

But if I don't get hands wet now, there'll be a whole lot more.

Some of it is easy: a wipe and it is done.

But some of it requires work, the remnants well stuck on.

These moments make me speculate on food's relative strength

How hard it is to get it off : I go to many lengths

To make sure that a bowl is clean and smoother to the touch.

It is a task, I will admit, I don't like very much.

*

Breakfast time's unrivalled as the hardest time for cleaning;

Porridge, muesli, Weetabix - their staying power's demeaning.

The residue of these delights will stick to every thing.

It likes to stay and hang around, it's difficult to sling:

It doesn't want to be removed, it fights against the scrub.

You coax it with a watery soak before you can give it a rub.

If you're lucky, it will come right off - your effort is fulfilled!

If not, you need to try again, a battle of strong will.

*

But what if you could use the strength of cereal cement?

I ponder this, whilst wiping; I barely make a dent

On its stubborn hardened form, floating in my sink.

Could this stuff be used for good? My mind begins to think

Of villages created out of little Weetabix.

A splash of milk to keep in place a house of wheaty bricks.

You could decorate with muesli or some soggy ricey puffs;

There really are no limits with these early breakfast stuffs.

*

But as my thoughts continue, I see there is a flaw

As the bowl gleams on the draining board, no food there anymore.

The water has dissolved quite well the sticky breakfast glue;

Its mark is lifted, no trace there, the surface is like new.

I thought that cereal cement was the perfect building tool

But water - its erosive skills - might make me look a fool.

The bixs, the muesli and the puffs, the materials to construct -

Optimum wetness needs some thought or the buildings will be fucked!

They might last a little longer if they're left alone to stand

But if there was a thunderstorm, are they are able to withstand

The full force of Mother Nature as she wets them with her rain?

My mind is filled with people fleeing, faces full of pain

As their small house falls to pieces, soggy in a pile;

It only took some moisture for their home to be defiled.

Like Lilliputians, they would tie me down, get in my face -

"You told us cereal cement would build the perfect place!"

*

Maybe in a desert it would fare a little better?

At least, it won't be subject to the really wetter weather.

But I imagine creatures in the dark of desert night,

Starving, slavering, scary beasts, just come to take a bite

Out of someone's humble 'Bix abode to stave their gruesome hunger

And Old Man Holmes in bed at night is shivering with wonder

At what it is that is outside, a-nibbling at his house.

He wants to think it's something small, a furry little mouse

But he knows it's nothing cute and mild, a beast that he could tame;

But something wild and fierce and large, with teeth designed to maim.

If only he had listened to the man at "Bricks are Best"

And ignored the Kellogg's salesman in his snazzy shiny vest,

His house would be beyond the teeth of animals all wild

He wouldn't have to worry that they'd take away a child

Because his walls were edible with just a drop of rain.

He'd be able to repel them when his walls aren't made of grain.

*

The washing up is finished and my hands are towel dried.

The time has flown so quickly and I am bit surprised.

I glance down at the bowls I've washed, turned up with bottoms proud

Now free of cloying wheaty-ness when water is allowed.

I think about the Weetville folk and my fanciful ideas

Old Man Holmes's vigilance to face up to his fears.

*

Who knew a bowl of washing up could prompt such depth of thought?

My urgency is palpable - this whimsy must be caught

Before it dissipates and floats into the untold fog

Of stories, poems, articles I have no time to log.

If you liked this, you may like this:

But I am reconciled to the fact that you may not.

Perhaps you like more serious poetry:

Or how about a short story?

No? Well, you can't say I didn't try.