THERE are many ways to describe the process of selecting a new Tory leader.

For me it is akin to choosing which Crystal Palace player I’d like to score the winning goal against Brighton in the 90th minute of a Champions League final. Others have likened it to picking one’s favourite bit of diced carrot from a pool of vomit or deciding which portable loo to use on the third day of a festival.

I was actually in the bath when it became obvious that Johnson was on his way out, and I wrote a limerick to celebrate. The next morning, as the vultures continued to gather, I wrote another one, and from that point decided to chronicle the whole inglorious process in a series of limericks. (I think the limerick is the poetic form best suited to such a puke-inducing cavalcade of callous, self-serving, navel-gazing egotism.)

So here they are, in chronological order.

How it all started, written with some glee:

The Johnson continues to dangle
The Tories continue to wrangle
I’m here in the bath
Writing this for a laugh
As they all put themselves through the mangle.

The next morning:

They’re riven with hate and division
While we all look on with derision
The Johnson hangs on
Though his cronies are gone
And are planning a grand circumcision.

(I’ve never understood anyone on the left calling him Boris, given that Johnson is US slang for knob!)

Then:

It seems that he soon will be gone
But his legacy will linger on
As the venal and greedy
Throw crumbs to the needy
And billionaires’ hacks twitter on.

Soon he was Schrodinger’s prime minister. Gone, but still there…

His career has just kicked the bucket
Now he wants to stay on like a puppet
While some horrible shits
Tear each other to bits
And then vote for the next Tory muppet!

Next, a comment on the constituency of fossilised golf club bigots aka Tory members who will make the final selection:

As the candidates wrestle in slime
For the members it’s election time.
In the golf club, no fuss.
It must be Liz Truss.
Support guaranteed every time.

An aside about Lack Of Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries’ refusal to meet my union to discuss the ludicrous restrictions placed on musicians post-Brexit:

There once was a Culture Sec who
Refuses to meet the MU.
There still is, for now
Though I’m not quite sure how:
A brain cell is long overdue.

Then an ode to the first candidate to declare his hand:

The oleaginous Sunak
Is the first rat to leap from the pack
He has all the appeal
Of a Catherine wheel
Lit, and spinning round one’s scrotal sac.

And Johnson was STILL there!

To the Johnson, a legacy. Lies,
Fake ruffled hair, half open flies.
Pigs now fight for his trough —
But he’s not waddled off.
And the Press concur. There’s a surprise.

Then a summation of the entire process:

There’s a row between posh right wing loons
And some dorks with less brains than balloons
And once two are selected
The PM’s elected
By old bigots in Wetherspoons.

The other leading candidate:

Not sure that there’s one who's Moredaunting
She’s planning a Number 10 haunting...
A union basher
And workers’ rights trasher
Her far-right credentials she’s flaunting

And bringing it up to date so far, written last Thursday:

They’re promising loads of tax cuts
While the poor all get kicked in the guts
‘You’ve got your food banks
We’ve our private ones, thanks –
Lose your homes? We’ll set up nissen huts’

This one has a rather less liberal last line which may appeal to the more unreconstructed of our readers:

Stick the whole lot in prison camp huts.

I’ll leave you with that thought, comrades.
Enjoy Tolpuddle.

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