Spectator competition: tips of the slung — or poems as the Revd W.A. Spooner might have written them (plus: an author’s acknowledgments page with a twist)

The diminutive, myopic Revd W.A. Spooner was the inspiration behind the recent call for Spooneristic poems. The long-time warden of New College, Oxford bequeathed us such comic gems as ‘The Lord is a shoving leopard’ and ‘kinkering kongs their titles take’. Not everyone was laughing, though. ‘Am I the only one who finds this exercise extraordinarily difficult?’ wailed Brian Murdoch. He’s got a point. Judging the entries was a brain-addling process, so goodness knows what torture it must have been to write them. Still, it was a large and lively entry. The winners are rewarded with a well deserved £25 each. Sylvia Fairley snaffles £30.

Sylvia Fairley Send my abandoned tart to hell In flames, my fuel crate; The witch I’m bedding sent a note, A catalogue of hate.

What balm can ever tease my ears? (I need to know my blows…) She says she’ll book my calls for tea, I’d rather lose my toes.

I’ve ‘wooed her with a lack of pies’? ‘A shining wit!’ she said, ‘Why don’t I go to Bates Motel And shake a tower instead?’

No woman now will heal my start, I’ve flung out hags — a warning That girls, like words, are found to buck Me up; the truth is dawning.

Nicholas Hodgson I could be buying in lead, but no, The dizzy beauties of the day Prevail.