Ahh, Bisto

Redbridge stands by the dock on a wooden crate
that proclaims, Ahh, Bisto! Use Bisto Gravy.
As a child, he'd dreamed of being a Bisto Kid
who'd convert the world to the wonders of Bisto.

His daughter Molly hands out pamphlets to all
who'll accept one. He must get the Word out
before the midday sun burns the pedestrians
from the streets; meanwhile, villagers hustle

to market, tidy away their Saturday chores.
He received the Word from the mouth of Jesus,
he honors the Lord's Word, swishes it round
his tongue as he regales all who'll listen,

to assure them how good the Word tastes:
an elixir for the world's ills. He yells
parables to passersby. The fishermen mend
their nets; he's a fisher of men. Ahh, Bisto!

When Roy and I Dug to Find Solomon's Vaults

Mr. McDougall, the chandler, an ex-footballer,
played for Liverpool and Scotland, but you couldn't
see his nobbly and scarred fullback's knees
for his long gray coat; his shop smelled of Esso blue

paraffin and soap and cold steel chains.
He rented Roy and me the spades we'd employ
to find Solomon's Vaults, the stream that flowed
underground through our Mossley Hill suburb,

wriggled on an antique map south from Rose Lane,
past where Nanna's house stood on Aigburth Hall
Avenue--when it rained hard, Grandad's greenhouse
stood islanded, his Queen Liz roses drowned.

I'd read about local quack Dr. Samuel Solomon,
how his Balm of Gilead, a concoction of brandy
and herbs made him a fortune circa 1800. I only
learned years later the cordial was sold to control

masturbation: "a destructive habit of a private nature."
He marketed it to society across Britain and Empire,
--three spoonfuls of his Balm of Gilead would revive
Roy and me after our dig to find his Vaults,

for we dug and dug, and found only orange clay. Grandad
gave us each half a crown--he didn't need to turn over
the potato patch that spring. We had blisters on our
hands, a hole deep enough to reach Singapore.

Hydrangeas

In the garden wall, I hide a brass threepenny bit
under the loose brick by Nanna's pink hydrangeas.
The threepenny joeys she saved in a plastic purse
for that rainy day. Sprinkle hydrangea powder

around the scene of the crime and the thief
will be revealed to you. The nails and coins
she buried in the soil to make the blooms
turn from pink to blue. A thief sprinkles

hopeful powder on the Judge's seat, in the jury
box, round a purple candle, to influence the court.
Luck can't be bought or stolen, only wished for.

^

Biography

Christopher T. George was born in Liverpool, England, in 1948. He is now a U.S. citizen and a 34-year resident of Baltimore, Maryland, where he lives with his wife Donna and two cats, Mamie and Leonard, near the Johns Hopkins University Homewood campus. Chris works full-time as a medical editor in Washington, DC. His poems have appeared in numerous print publications including Poet Lore, Bogg, Smoke, Lite, Pudding, and Maryland Poetry Review, and on-line in Melic Review, Pierian Springs, Crescent Moon Journal, MiPo Digital, Worm, Triplopia, and Painted Moon Review. Chris is also a published historian and a lyricist for a new musical about Jack the Ripper written with French composer Erik Sitbon, Jack-The Musical, http://www.jack-themusical.com. Chris believes that the mission of poets is to entertain, to enlighten, and to humanize the world. He is Associate Editor at Desert Moon Review http://www.desertmoonreview.com and an Editor at Writer's Block http://www.webdelsol.com/bbs/arts/arts.cgi