Winthrop Mackworth Redivivus

It’s for Regency now I’m enthusing

    So we’ve Regency stripes on the wall

And—my dear, really frightf’lly amusing—

    A dome of wax fruit in the hall.

We’ve put the Van Gogh in the bathroom,

    Those sunflowers looked so out of date,

But instead, as there’s plenty of hearth room,

    Real ivy grows out of the grate.

And plants for indoors are the fashion—

    Or so the News Chronicle said—

So I’ve ventured some housekeeping cash on

    A cactus which seems to be dead.

An artist with whom we’re acquainted

    Has stippled the dining-room stove

And the walls are alternately painted

    Off-yellow and festival mauve.

The Minister’s made the decision

    That Cedric’s department must stay

So an O.B.E. (Civil Division)

    Will shortly be coming his way.

To you, dear, and also to me, dear,

    It’s nothing, for you are a friend,

Not even if you and I see, dear,

    A knighthood, perhaps, in the end.

But it wasn’t for this that I fill’d a

    Whole page up with gossip of course.

No: I’m dreadf’lly concerned for Matilda

    Who seems to believe she’s a horse.

She neighs when we’re sitting at table

    And clutches a make-believe rein.

Her playroom she fancies a stable.

    Do you think she is going insane?

I know I would not let them christen her—

    Such an old superstition’s absurd—

But when Cedric was reading The Listener

    Before he tuned in to the Third,

She walked on all fours like a dumb thing

    And nibbled my plants, I’m afraid.

Do you think we could exorcize something

    If we called in the Church to our aid?

Ex-horse-ize—that’s rather funny—

    But it’s not very funny to me

For I’ve spent all her grandmother’s money

    On analysis since she was three.

And just when we’d freed her libido

    We went off to Venice and Rome

(You’ll remember we met on the Lido)

    And left dear Matilda at home.

I’m afraid that that Riding School did it,

    The one where we sent her to stay;

Were she horse-mad before, then she hid it

    Or her analyst kept it at bay.

But that capable woman in Surrey

    Who seemed so reliable too,

Said “Leave her to me and don’t worry,

    This place is as good as the Zoo.

When she’s not on a horse she’s not idle;

    She can muck out the stables and clean

Her snaffle and saddle and bridle

    Till bed-time at seven-fifteen.”

Twenty guineas a week was the price, dear,

    For Matilda it may have been bliss,

But for us it is not very nice, dear,

    To find it has left her like this.