Michael Casey from Birmingham, the modern Aesop

Michael Casey from Birmingham, the modern Aesop

yes, I'm abusing Aesop

But if you tell a tale and there is a moral to it

then that's like Aesop

though in my case, I stumble over things

Like knicker elastic, as your pants dangle beneath your jeans

and as you tug at them in the street, people think you have some disease

or a rat in your pants, or twerking lessons gone wrong

my mother has an accident at Mass, and she went daily

her knicker elastic broke, so she hid in the confessional

and took her bloomers off, as big as a state flag

and put them in her cherry coloured leather shopping bag

50 years ago people didn't have ubiquitous plastic bags

But an over eager young cleric went into the confessional

and heard her confession, the funniest story he'd ever hear confessed

but he could never share it

covered by the seal of the confessional

unlike my mother's knickerless backside

now am I lying or just a good writer

both

writing is lying on paper

In fact my mother nipped behind the door to the choir loft

to safely stow away her knickers

the confessional bit I made up cos I'm a good writer

and that's what writers do, they improve reality

So what has this got to do with Aesop?

Well its a good story

and the moral

Be quick if your knickers. come off

or you will be caught

or be able to react well in a crisis

or improvising is everything

if you share a secret be certain it will never be revealed

unlike your backside if your knickers come of

and if you actually have a secret hide it behind a closed door

where nobody will know, such as behind the door to the choir loft

though one of our priests was an organ scholar

and he was always up in the choir loft playing

on the church organ