Michael Bench-Capon

@mikebenchcapon

I have a PhD in philosophy and now I work in a library. He/him. michaelbenchcapon.blogspot.com

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Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· 19d

Cartoon with people sitting round fire in cave; adult explains to three smaller people "Yes, the planet got destroyed. But for a beautiful moment in time we [next bit clearly edited] could ride the bus for £2"

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· 20d

Back on the creative grind

New Wardrobe

On first entering professional life
I bought a wide variety of shirts
And three identical pairs of trousers
(Jackets and ties were not expected of me)

The trousers attracted no attention
But served as a backdrop for the shirts
The Wise to their Morecambe
And the shirts were a real hit

I took these compliments with awkward pleasure
I found the interactions embarrassing
And had a foolish line I'd use about Pierre Cardin
But was glad to be thought to look good

I left that world to become a poet
And now I dress accordingly
I wear a lot of secondhand scarves
They receive no compliments

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· 26d

Wrote another sonnet; this one's a bit more personal than I usually do

Muddle

Whenever I have a letter to post
Or a sandwich wrapper to toss
Into a Big Belly trash compactor
I am gripped with the same thought:

What if I throw my wallet in instead?
"Like Mr Muddle," as I like to put it
But it is not likely to happen
And it would only be a great inconvenience

Deep in the Pacific
A stone's plop from the hadal zone
Submarine Commander Muddle stares blankly at the controls
Red for Armageddon
Blue for air conditioning
He feels uncomfortably warm

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· 27d

Wrote a poem about oranges. It doesn't rhyme, obviously

To the Orange

You are a fruit by which so many others are defined
Satsumas, clementines, tangerines, mandarins
All these, in the mind of the eater
Are but small oranges
(The kumquat is a special case)

Your juice is a standard juice, a staple
And a screwdriver made with clementine juice
Would be fancy
But a screwdriver nonetheless

You are perhaps the least peelable fruit
That is still peeled without tools
(One would not face a pineapple unarmed)
In this you call to mind the harp
The least wieldy instrument still carried from place to place
(And harpists rarely have roadies)
How much must harpists love their harps
And how much must we love you

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· 28d

I wrote a poem about books. You all like books, right

Two Books

Down in the stacks
Two books sit side by side
*Beef Production*
And *Profitable Beef Production*
The first, written alone
The second, later, with help
Two roads diverge
I imagine the self that would read the first
Rich? Perhaps. Or simply the captain of my soul?

And if I were a cow, would I prefer
My beef to be produced profitably
Or without regard for such things?
One does not want to die in vain, and yet

And is there nothing to be said
For the uncut mentorship of Mac Cooper?
A rugby man (two Scotland caps, three Oxford blues)
He had a vision
I might fulfil it
And so I choose

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· 28d

Trump's approval rating is back up to 40% www.natesilver.net/p/trump-appr...

Detail of a chart from January to July 2026, the present, showing disapprove at 56.4% and approve at 40.0%, approval was higher than 40 in Jan, went noisily down and then back up to 40, and disapproval is roughly a mirror image

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· 29d

As part of my recent experimentation with various poetic forms, today I wrote a coarse limerick

If you eat vast amounts of protein
And the rest of your diet is green
Then the men at the gym
Will say "wow! look at him
But don't smell him - his farts are obscene"

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jul 10

Earlier this year I wrote a song about the sun; the tune is basically this www.beepbox.co#9n41s6k2l0He... if you want to sing along

Morning Sun Number One

Wake up and look at the morning sun
Everything good in life
Comes ultimately from the sun so
Wake up and smile at the morning sun
It gives us energy
Both literally and figuratively
Don't get me wrong
I'm not saying that
You should worship the sun
Instead of whoever you've worshipped heretofore
Just be happy that there's a sun
It's the source of all the good things in life
Also the bad things
Don't focuse on those

Wake up and look at the morning sun
Don't look directly at it
Your optician will not thank you
Just take its presence in
That's more fun
Go for a run
If that's the sort of thing you like to do
Now don't get me wrong
I'm not saying that
You should worship the sun
Instead of whoever you've worshipped heretofore
Just be happy that there's a sun
It's the source of all the good things in life
Also the bad things
Don't focus on those

Wake up and look at the morning sun
Everything good in life
Comes ultimately from the sun and
It shines its light upon everyone
Just and unjust alike
We all enjoy its wondrous bounty
Don't get me wrong
I'm not saying that
You should worship the sun
In violation of the first commandment
But if you did
You'd be in the company of
Druids, some Romans, Akhenaten
Can twenty million Aztecs be wrong

Wake up and look at the morning sun
Everything good in life
Comes ultimately from the sun so
Early each morning salute that sun
Bow down before it
Let it shower you with solar goodness
Don't get me wrong
I'm not saying that
You should change your religion
To the ancient cult of Sol Invictus
But if you did
Nobody could blame you
It's the source of all the good things in life
Also the bad things
Try not to focus on those

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jul 9

I've written another poem. It's called Atlas

Atlas

One day, as Atlas held the sky aloft
He felt a tickle in his throat, and coughed
The sky began to shake, but did not fall
And no-one really noticed outside Gaul

Now, I imagine that you think you know
Exactly where my tale's about to go
You're thinking "Skyquakes? Gaul? I know your game
You clumsily have telegraphed your aim
It is a Just So Story telling why
The Gauls feared being flattened by the sky"

Well, first of all, that *is* a decent guess
And I am even minded to confess
I did go that way in an early draft
I read it at a slam. Nobody laughed.
In fear of a repeat humiliation
I judged it needed much modification

And so, no tale of fear of sky on head
You get this metanarrative instead

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jul 9

I assume the Freddies are named after Flintoff and/or Mercury. Freddys are of course rarer

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jul 3

Perhaps the Portugal player's touch was not considered sufficiently deliberate www.theifab.com/laws/latest/...

A player (Team A) makes a long pass towards a forward (Team A) who is in an offside position, close to the opponents’ penalty area. A defender (Team B) also chases after the ball and kicks it first while running (limited contact with the ball in the air). After that, the forward receives the ball and passes it to a team-mate who scores a goal. What is the correct decision?
The referee disallows the goal for an offside offence. The defender’s contact with the ball is not considered to be ‘deliberate play’ because they were not in control of the ball and had no possibility of clearing it by kicking. Although the ball travelled from distance, the defender was running without time to coordinate their body movement.

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jul 1

I wrote another poem today. Not a double dactyl this time

Ball

Ball of dust and hair in the hall
I could stop and scoop you with my fingers
Leaving only insignificant flecks
And take you to the kitchen bin
It would be like nothing.
Willed, done, over

You are a little furry thing
Like a gerbil or a rat
I do not think of you as a pet
Nor as vermin
Your inertness is a part of your charm

I have seen you there before
And had similar thoughts
You have already become familiar
But I will not miss you when you are gone

Is it a shameful thing
To have a ball of dust and hair in one's hall?
I will not miss you when you are gone

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 30

I wrote another poem today; this one is a double dactyl

Platypus ploctypus
Ollie the octopus
Has a petition to
Clean up the seas

While you are signing, a
Semi-autonomous
Tentacle's stealing your
Wallet and keys

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 28

High of 22° Drizzle and a moderate breeze

Weather forecast for today showing a black cloud with blue drizzle dots falling from it, high of 22°, low of 11°, drizzle and a moderate breeze

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 27

Normal Winnie-the-Pooh: "useless major"
Tuxedo Winnie-the-Pooh: "versatile major"

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 25

Every hometown's got the ominous megastructure. What's yours?

Dark sandstone cylindrical column topped with slab and sphere against light but cloudy sky, source link https://lighthouseaccommodation.co.uk/listings/grange-mariners-beacon/

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 24

Wrote another sonnet

Onion

I learned to cook from my aunt Gwendoline
She had a lot of skill, but unusual taste
And so, as a result
I don't know how to chop an onion

I do like eating onions
And would include them in my food
Except I fear the dish would be dragged down
By this specific ineptitude

This afternoon, I right the wrong
I have a new knife and multiple large sacks
Some white, some red
A chopping board that won't survive the day
And I have watched an instructional video
By someone I can trust

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 23

Found iambic pentameter

Text from Wikipedia: "Most modernists disdained the villanelle, which became associated with the overwrought formal aestheticism of the 1890s, i.e., the decadent movement in England.[16] In his 1914 novel A Portrait of the Artist as a...". I have highlighted "Most modernists disdained the villanelle"

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 16

OK now I have done one in an approximation of the traditional style

The Net

A tightrope-walker, high above the net
Considers all those things he has to lose
If ever his great skill he should forget
Or he is let down by his special shoes

Lost footing, and ensuing loss of face
And of the crowd (at least, their admiration)
He faces these potential fates with grace
More saddened than stunned by their contemplation

Without a net, he does not think of falling
To focus on the task in hand? Perhaps
But also what would follow from a lapse
Is more unthinkable than just appalling
Death oversteps the limits of the mind
As life will do once it is left behind

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 14

I disagree with the sentiment but I did enjoy some of the writing

Nowadays, I can’t even listen to Radio 4. It doesn’t care about my demographic any more; it’s been rejigged for younger people who say “like”, so that for fluent speakers such as myself it feels like being hit repeatedly on the head with a foam rubber mallet by a stoned Barbary ape.

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 11

Wrote another sonnet. Still haven't levelled up to rhyming ones in iambic pentameter yet, although some of the lines in this one (and in the last one about a lake) are iambic pentameters, so I'm getting there

Dear Granama

She loves cryptic crosswords, and insists
Her grandchildren call her "Granama"
It is an anagram of "anagram"
She finds this hilarious

The kids do not
Although they do accommodate her wish
The younger one doesn't get it
And the elder is uneasy about the capital G

But a third, not yet born, will be tickled pink
They will correspond like *philosophes*
Millions of words

They will talk about the clues they cannot solve
And entertain each other with their own
And have an inside joke about unclued lights

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 10

Had a go at writing a sonnet of sorts; I'm not super happy with it but I do think this book of sonnets I've been reading is giving me more of a feel for them

Lake

Clothed in brown sackcloth, she sleeps
Back down in mud
Many feet below the waves
Or the ripples, on calmer days

The water fills her nostrils and lungs
But she lives
By something supernatural sustained
A sword lies sheathed across her abdomen

One day, awoken by the clamour of destiny
She rises, and puts on her ceremonial robe
White samite

She takes up the sword and kicks to the surface, arm aloft
A great throw, and she sinks, and sleeps once more
She hopes she will not need to wake again

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 8

We don't usually see each other's headers. Mine is a cropped version of a perpetual motion machine. Here's the full version

Crude MS Paint style diagram labelled in comic sans: A metal ball (magnetic) goes up a slope towards a PERMANENT magnet suspended in midair; at the top the the slope the ball falls down a hole, driving a turbine, which has an arrow coming off it pointing towards three Bitcoin symbols. Then the ball rolls back to the right, goes past a one-way hinge and is ready to go up the slope again.

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 7

Yesterday I came across another poem about an insect trying to get out of a window; I like Reid's well enough but I think I still prefer mine. He also used the loop/swoop rhyme, which I guess is unfortunate

Christopher Reid
Fly
A fat fly fuddles for an exit
at the window-pane.
Bluntly, stubbornly, it inspects it,
like a brain
nonplussed by a seemingly simple sentence
in a book,
which the glaze of unduly protracted acquaintance
has turned to gobbledygook.

A few inches above where the fly fizzes
a gap of air
waits, but this has
not yet been vouchsafed to the fly.
Only retreat and a loop or swoop of despair
will give it the sky.

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 5

I'm afraid I have written another one

The Poet's Dilemma, and its Solution

There is no more poetic place
Than sitting up atop a dais
And naught more lyrical to see
Than something made of filigree
For bards, there is no substance awesomer
Than that substance known as gossamer

But these are things we rarely find
And therefore the poetic mind
Instead resorts to simile
"Like gossamer!" "As filigree!"
'Twixt truth beauty we must choose
But I've devised a cunning ruse

These lines once writ, I'll take my pen
And I will scratch them out again
Tomorrow, and its morrow, too
I'll versify this page anew
Till with our Holy Grail I'm blessed:
A bona fide palimpsest

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 5

OK here is a draft of the sestet, is it worth writing the octave

As lightning splits in two a cloudless sky
And ambushes a great cathedral spire
To tear its glory down to cooling embers
So my hubristic project caught the eye
Of Russell, who sent his avenging fire:
A postcard, reading "set of non-self-members?"

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 5

In Leeds about 24% of the votes went to Reform at the local elections, but I very rarely come across people exhibiting the kind of attitudes that could make sense of preferring Farage to Starmer. I tend to assume I'm just in a bubble, but maybe people really don't see Reform as the party of this guy

Daryll off Peep Show wearing a Nazi military uniform and frowning

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 2

I wrote a poem about what a brilliant poet I am

The Master Prosodist

I am a master prosodist
The rhythm of my words bewitches
Even though they seldom rhyme
I know just when to add an extra foot

No, little flowing from my pen
Rhymes with another nearby line
And furthermore I don't have much to say

My stanzas are not all of equal length
But readers tend to see this as a virtue
When reading verses by a master prosodist

They like it when they're made to strive
(To seek, to find, and not to yield)
When it is far from obvious
How a line should be performed

To read a poem twice, or thrice
And still remain unsure if one
Has nailed the rhythm, the skips, the runs
They like the certainty they are not reading doggerel
The poet's refusal to deploy a cheap trick

In awe of chutzpah
"Were I a poet," thinks the reader
"I would not think to dare to try
To get away with *that*"

Simplicity has a place
Predictable rhythm, and rhyme too
But I give you more:
Surprises, lines that make you stumble
Suffering, painful, wretched lines
Lines that breathe, and call out
To be read and read again
Until you hear in your own voice
My voice, the voice
Of a master prosodist

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 2

Here it is; he likes Salinger and Updike archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes....

[Q] What do you think of recent American writing?

[A] Well, seldom more than two or three really first-rate writers exist simultaneously in a given generation. I think that Salinger and Updike are by far the finest artists in recent years.

I'm not a good speaker, you see. When I start to speak, I have immediately four or five lines of thought*sort of roads, you know, trails going various ways. And I have to decide which trail I'm going to follow, and while I decide this, hawing and hemming begins, and it may be very upsetting because I hear it myself. I can never understand those limpid, fluid speakers, as my father was, who just deliver perfect phrases, beautifully built, with an aphorism here, you know, and a metaphor there. I can't do it. I have to think it out; I have to take a pencil; I have to write it down laboriously; have it before me. I do things like that. It's probably psychological. I can imagine what old Freud would have said, whom I heartily detest, as my readers know by now.

[Q] Mr. Nabokov, would you tell us why it is that you detest Dr. Freud?

Michael Bench-Capon@mikebenchcapon· Jun 1

Wrote a poem today