No 3658 Set by Ian Birchall

As we'd already had comps satirising children and the old, we wanted to do the 30-50 age group. We wanted poems in praise of good health, earning power and all the "perks" this group enjoys. Hmmm.

Report by Ms de Meaner

Ah, the passion, the emotion, the . . . bitterness. I loved it. I particularly liked M E Ault and Andrew Wilcox - but then, they had Hilaire Belloc and T S Eliot as inspirations. Hon menshes to T Griffiths, D A Prince and George Cowley for his line "I am 50, going on 30". We know what you mean, George. We do! £20 to the winners; the vouchers go to Andrew Wilcox.

We are the OK men

We are the fit men

Exercising together

Headphones filled with Vivaldi. Alas!

Our braying voices, when

We call up from the train,

Are strident and meaningless

As a jeep outside a hypermarket

Or a tornado over Bognor.

And is it worth it, after all?

After the bistros and the sushi and investment plans,

After the company car and the health cover?

Between the shopping and the bill,

Falls the Shadow.

Between 49 and 51,

Falls the Shadow.

This is the way the world ends,

Not with a bang but with a subscription to the Oldie.

Andrew Wilcox

Middle youth's just one long party, isn't it?

You start out happy, hopeful, sober, fit.

If you have wit, you find by thirty-three

the trendy way to fake urbanity.

Next you discover symbols of success

are won by those whose private life's a mess.

You chase promotion: when the prize is lost

you think that you've been robbed or double-crossed.

You give your patient family much more time:

your partner leaves; your children turn to crime.

You take up gourmet eating, sorrow's drowned;

your waistline spreads; another partner's found.

You taste ennui; you pettifog, complain

and learn to jog. Your new love's off again.

And as retirement looms with all its threats,

you plan your speech will say you've no regrets.

M E Ault

As you solve all the problems Unesco

Can't crack, as you're wheeling your trolley

To the delicatessen at Tesco,

Have you thought of investing your lolly

In something more ethically healthy

Than dotcoms or high-street emporia?

I know that you're famously wealthy,

and your head isn't very much hoarier

Yet. But although you eat mango

And starfruit and spotty exotica,

And you work for a regular quango

Controlling the flow of erotica,

Have you thought how your children will boot you

As you sit at your laptop sedately?

Are you certain the future will suit you?

Have you looked at your pension plan lately?

Will Bellenger

It's a joy to be totally healthy

As my laptop boots up on the train,

And to know that I'm really quite wealthy

With a house, plus a villa in Spain.

But this feeling of loss never goes now,

And this feeling as if I'm caged:

I suppose this is what it must feel like

To be perfectly middle-aged.

Yes, my family's perfectly darling,

And my friends influential and bright;

And I've switched to Rioja from Carling,

Yet I still wake up screaming each night.

But at work I am known and I'm rated,

And I win corp'rate battles waged,

And I dress in Paul Smith (understated)

Since I'm perfectly middle-aged.

And I've dabbled in shares and in stocks, mate

Because profit's no longer a crime.

No, I don' t watch a lot on the box, late -

'Cos I really don't have any time.

But I've started to listen to arias

And I went to that strange Hirst cow.

Yes, I'm now really jumping the barriers

To be perfectly middle-brow.

Yes, I'm terribly cosseted, matey,

And my life is a little cocoon.

But I've noticed that sometimes, just lately,

I start thinking: Please, Death, take me soon.

Where's the passion, the joy, the exploring?

God - it's years since I felt outraged!

Maybe that's why it's terribly boring

To be perfectly middle-aged.

Keith Mason

No 3661 Set by John Crick

Roy Hattersley wrote in the Sunday Times (15 October): "Rain was and is part of our life. Part of being British. To treat it like an enemy is to reject one of the great influences on our history and character." We would like patriotic tributes or celebrations to this formative influence. Alternatively, you could produce a history text in which you explain just how it has been so important. Max 200 words. Entries should be in by 4 January.

E-mail: comp@newstatesman.co.uk

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