Today I am very happy to host a piece from Jonathan Wonham’s new prose poetry collection, Vulgar Variants. You may recall that a few months back its predecessor, Ordinary Others, was also featured here. The book is illustrated by Suzanne Smith.
Doctor T
Former research scientist at the nuclear defence agency Doctor T was a happy active fellow always running everywhere no time to waste was one of the favourite sayings of Doctor T an expert on the dynamics of nuclear fission Doctor T had one day woken from an apocalyptic vision of the fruits of his own research and decided to become a physics teacher now Doctor T no longer wore a radiation suit instead he wore a brown tweed jacket and a checked shirt he had a trim moustache and a trim waist he was all over a very trim figure Doctor T always progressed all over school with haste the children liked Doctor T mainly for his mistakes for example the time when Doctor T was demonstrating the mechanical advantage of pulleys and lifted himself on a swing by standing on it Doctor T pulled his legs out from under him and cracked his nut on the linoleum Doctor T was a hard nut to crack he lay on his back some minutes when Doctor T came round he told the class to wake up and follow him one of the favourite sayings of Doctor T was wake up and follow me to the bunker Doctor T usually said this to his own kids in the wee small hours one of the achievements of Doctor T was to build his own small bunker three hours distant from home somewhere on the west coast where the post-apocalyptic air would be fresher the kids of Doctor T nowadays hated to wake up and hear wake up and follow me it meant a three hour drive to the west coast in the old and very safe car of Doctor T followed by a weekend in the cold underground chamber where the wife of Doctor T made the best of it reading the kids books and cooking meals from long life rations Doctor T only wished for them all a long life listening attentively to news on the long wave radio to see if the imminent threat had passed Doctor T had passed his whole life listening to various ultimatums dropped from on high now Doctor T had his own ultimate defence against whatever might come out of the sky and being a physicist and somewhat of an expert on plutonium Doctor T had worked out the required thickness of concrete above his head the required speed to cross the country in his very safe car Doctor T found the whole situation kept his mind very much alive although a little distracted and hence the mistakes made by Doctor T that kept the children so well amused like when he uncorked the mercury in his trouser pocket it was just an accident said Doctor T it wasn’t like he had just blown up the nuclear test facility.
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You can find out more about Jonathan’s work via his Facebook page.
Vulgar Variants can be purchased for £ 5.00 + £ 1.50 P&P
By Cheque to : 105 Benslow Lane, Hitchin, Herts, SG4 9RA
or by PayPal payment to wonham@mac.com (please use friends and family option)
Remember to include postal delivery address
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