Answering back | 6 April 2017

In Competition No. 2991 you were invited to submit ‘The Rime of the Wedding Guest’.
 
There were, naturally, lots of clever nods in the entry to Coleridge’s ballad of sin and atonement, but some were more charitable than others to the gimlet-eyed seadog with verbal diarrhoea. In a hotly contested week, Brian Allgar, Chris O’Carroll, Graham King, Max Gutmann and Mike Morrison came close to glory but were pipped by the winners below, who take £25 each. Basil Ransome–Davies nabs £30.
 

My mates and me were larging it,
As pissed as several newts.
Three wedding guests, we was all dressed
In Jasper Conran suits.
 
This geezer came up — ponged a bit,
Well hairy, bleedin’ old —
With ‘No offence, excuse me, gents,
My tale has to be told.’
 
His style was not just roundabout;
You wouldn’t call him sane.
His story’d veer from there to here
And halfway back again.
 
But yeah, one single fact stood out:
His bird caused his despair.
Long story short? The clingy sort.