It might come in a letter,
darkness falls in a telephone call;
I await the unexpected
with one ear to the party wall.
Is it the pricking of the conscience,
is it the itching of hair shirt,
is it the dictionary definition
of a precipice to skirt?
It's the nutter alert.
Though this face is familiar
something in it has bred contempt;
I never asked for your opinion
or your back-handed compliments.
Oh, but here comes that special nonsense
all the words out in a spurt,
the unhinging of the trolley
as the mouth begins to blurt...
it's the nutter alert
I can see we're in trouble
from that glint in the eye you've got;
there's no sense to the story,
comprehensively lost, the plot.
And how contorted is that logic
you so forcefully exert:
you're a car crash in the making,
head-on, that's a racing cert.
It's the nutter alert,
this is the nutter alert.