A blank sheet of paper… a blank sheet of paper?
We’ll go for a caper, we’ll kidnap a jauntin the centre of the hungry night.
Why, I’m not sure, my stomach feels gaunt,
I feel in the mood for a bite.
I’m hungry for pizza, baguette, a biscuit and cheese.
I’m hungry for eggs, baked potato, I’m hungry for peas.
I’m hungry for a nice Malay chicken curry
to enjoy so much without being in a hurry.
There’s nothing in the fridge, but I want a bite.
I’m hungry, I’m hungry now in the night.
My wife puts the eggs away, as if they’re part of her wealth,
or tucks them away behind the gas bottle.
I try to find them, using reconnaissance and stealth,
whilst noting the increasing hunger mode throttle.
I’m hungry for a piece of cold chicken wing
but it’s early, now around eight o’clock at night.
I’m hungry for the chicken rice my housemate will bring.
I get a rumble stomach message when I must have a bite.
Is hunger a result of a few glasses of beer?
Is it this that takes hunger into top gear?
‘Ha, ha,’ she says, ‘you’ve nothing to eat,
there’s nothing for you in the fridge tonight,
there’s nothing to chew, to swallow, to bite.’
My housemate’s husband, she refuses to please;
the poor man is allowed only two crackers and cheese,
no wonder he’s half fallen down to his knees…
but for past few months, his life’s been a breeze...
for when she’s over here, in rural wet Gwent,
he’s out in Africa, in an oil worker’s tent,
where, unknown to her, he can eat through the night.
There’s little around him he can’t get a bite;
a zebra, gazelle, a buffalo steak,
washed down with Khartoum ice cream cake.
‘Oh, oh,’ he sings, ‘I can eat through the night,
my wife’s away in rural Gwent, enjoying vegetable fare,
here I am in Africa; the only thing I don’t have is bear.
But that doesn’t bother me one tiny iota
for I can always, without doubt, exceed my quota.
I know that, anytime I want a bite
I always can, at any time, eat through the night.’
But the local animals were in less than good cheer.
‘If Mr Roy keeps eating, half of us now, tomorrow won’t be here.
Apart from the hippos, crocs, porcupines, and vulture,
there’s no doubt he’s affecting traditional African culture.’
The brightest of the monkeys said ‘I think the right thing
is to get the Government to transfer him to Beijing.’
‘Hooray,’ they sang, from lunchtime to night,
but were worried about the Asian animals’ plight.
True, he might find the pandas rather too fat and hairy,
but scorpions etc, he would have to be wary.
In Beijing, he went around market, the stall and the shop,
seeing animals that could jump and fly, run, crawl and hop.
and he thought,‘I’m going to like it here,
stuffed crab, roast chicken, steamed fish, tender deer,
washed down with hot tea, or cold Chinese beer.’
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘yes, yes, yes, I’m going to enjoy it here.’
The next day his boss told Roy to report, in the rain,
at the domestic departure hall, to take the next plane.
‘You’re an oil man, so we go where there is oil,
far to the west, of sandstorms, where temperatures boil.’
Roy, poor man, reeled, as if hit by a blast,
his ashen complexion, he looked rather aghast.
‘But what do we eat,
out there in the heat?
Oh dear, oh dear, what can I do now?
Most of the locals, I think, rely on a cow.’
‘Ah,’ said the boss, ‘up to last week that was true
but since then, we had to improvise, follow something new,
for there was an outbreak of some animal disease;
now we get by on just crackers and cheese.’
