Another Liverpool Christmas poem:
Threepence for Luck, Baby Blue
Mum puts silver threepenny bits in the Christmas pud
for luck, just for you. The steaming brown pud
bathed in brandy that Dad lights with a Swan Vesta match
flaring in the dark, the pudding glows mysterious blue,
singed black with a twig of holly on top,
ready to dig into after the turkey and sage stuffing,
the gravied mashed spuds, proletarian sprouts.
Ladled out and drenched in yellow Bird's custard,
time for us to hunt for the threepenny bits.
Mum says, "Don't break your teeth, Baby Blue!"
The hidden treasures emerge from the goo,
"I've found one! Have you?"
That's luck for me and luck for you.
Pink on my sideplate, stuck with pud, the big "three"
surmounted by a crown on the reverse,
in a Christmas wreath, I think,
on the obverse, George V or VI, maybe Victoria, too.
If I'm extra lucky, visit to the dentist deferred.
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Christopher T. George
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