Okay folks. After last month’s religiously contentious, but tonally facetious offering (those of you who solved it will have known what I mean, the rest of you can pretend you knew by reading the solution offered this month), here we have a poem which even the author has absolutely no clue to its meaning. It’s kind of a kid’s poem, but probably shouldn’t be read by children, as it might confuse them. It certainly confuses me. The rhyme scheme is also confusing, so I’m leaving you with it. You’re on your own. Good luck!

 

 

Finches and Toddlers

If the world would let me

I would ------ the moon

To our warm living ----

Pull it ------ each night

If the world would let me

 

I would harvest the dark

Sort the ----- from the grain

And turn it to ----

For ------- to fly through

And roost in the ----

If the world would let me

 

If the world would let me

I would infiltrate ------

With ---- logical schemes

So the days would -------

If the world would let me

 

I would make every sleep

The ---------- begun

Of a burgeoning ---

For -------- to pocket

And jealously ----

If the world would let me

 

1. Tie up in Crete there. (6)
2. Space for backwards Arab. (4)
3. Nearer or one who shuts? (6)
4. Agricultural waste in such affluence! (5)
5. Precipitation sounds like horse controller. (4)
6. Little birds take strong measures. (7)
7. Stop car in recreational area. (4)
8. Illusions note lots of paper. (6)
9. Increased amount heard in heath. (4)
10. Of French luminescence, please. (7)
11. Location of nativity sounds like flatfish for ship’s bed! (10)
12. Crap newspaper that isn’t The Star but is a star. (3)
13. Reds told mixed up little children. (8)
14. Retain tower part of castle. (4)

 

SOLUTION TO CRYPTIC POEM 005:  Advice to Young Atheists Attending Church Social Functions

If you bicker with the vicar

Then your evening may go quicker,

But being beastly to the priestly

Will not help your cause the leastly.

 

You can castigate the pastor

And the tea-dance will pass faster,

But despite your verbal tricks

You’ll find that faith and sense don’t mix.

 

Your reason will not reach a

Pious Pentecostal preacher

Who has never heard of Nietzsche

And has Him upstairs as teacher.

 

Damn this Dawkins talk your hawkin’!

Stir your tea and plunge your fork in

Pies with hard boiled eggs and pork in,

Fill your mouth and stop your squawkin’