Hymns
The urge to sing hymns
has recently
caught on amongst bank-robbers
With stentorian voices
they praise God
while the cashier sinks to her knees
and the bank manager
chiming in
turns out his pockets
Pianos
That pianos
should not merely be cooked
but also smoked
has recently been discovered
by pure chance
A fire in the local piano store
surprisingly revealed
that smoked pianos
sound nobler than cooked ones
In huge fireplaces
they now hang
those dispensers of musical delight
like blackened hams
before
smokey-grey and spicy
they satisfy the cognoscenti
Henceforth
the famous house of Bösenstein
will refrain
from boiling pianos hard or soft
according to taste
Laughing angels
Where those laughing angels
could have emerged from
remains obscure
Unfit for singing
they appear to some of us
devils in disguise
if not downright human
Others
see them as children
who never learnt to be wise
giggling
in the face of a threatening world
unfeeling like gods
· From Cursing Bagels by Alfred Brendel, published by Faber
