A Jack of all Knaves

 

A Jack of all Knaves

 

Sometimes you’d like to jack it all in,

my Johnkin, wish for the tin tack, the sack,

put the boot in, flirt with original sin

some negligence, misdemeanor, peccadillo,

tell me, is this the way to Amarillo,

Phoenix Nights - show me your Peter Kay,

homeward bound? It’s that way.

But Jack Sprat could eat no fat,

whilst ever-expanding girths of those who lack

for nothing, are in want of filling,

need stuffing, see? Keep on drilling,

keep on running, gimme some lovin, roll with it,

lumberjack, steeplejack - nothing bootjack

will ever have teeth enough to remove shoes,

pining for the fjords, what’s the use?

You’d fix that flat, but the jack’s gone AWOL,

the AA  won’t pick up the phone at all,

the RAC used to salute, you know,

but you’re stuck there and cannot roll

or join the great big convoy

and ain’t she a beautiful sight?

Rubber Duck, Pig Pen,

Spider Mike might allow

your tar to plant his jack on the ship’s prow,

watch that pennant flutter South

as she’s churning

her buttered Northbound wake –

HMS Raleigh, HMS Drake

bowling for jacks on Plymouth Sound

as the Spanish Armada’s Eastward bound

for the Philippines.

Or even you dream

of kicking back,

plugging headphones in the jack,

Hit the Road, Jack and don’t you come back

no more, no more, no more, no more.

Ah, it’s all a bit of Jackanory

what’s the story, Balamorey,

while she’s home at home from home

plumping your pillows,

licking her lips,

heaving bosom and see-through slips

standing with her hands on her rose-hips –

another month brings another wage

while you tell it like the end of days

coming on like a polymath’s sage

but all those scratched spirals speak

to nothing so much as a jack of all knaves.