5 April 2012
SONG
Fie on woe!
Balls to sorrow!
We shall drink
much less tomorrow.
Bugger angst
and lend, and borrow!
We shall drink
much less tomorrow.
Drain tonight
the botte d’oro!
We shall drink
much less tomorrow.
6 April 2012
GLAGOLITSA
Were I trout and this the hook
I’m already in the creel
having no will to resist
the long savoury allure
of its bubbling syllables.
Half-close your eyes - you can see
Saint Cyril’s candle-shadow
on the walls of the cow-lord
penning new shapes out of Greek
to render salvation’s words
into his host’s tangling tongue;
and beefy parchment volumes
inked red and black with monk-care
in the granite confidence
of the Slavic Almighty
and chanting to paint the air
with the matched sonance they make.
Glagolitsa! Soak the mouth,
the busy tongue and the throat
in this sensual freighted
plenipotent conjuring
word.
7 April 2012
COSTA CONCORDIA
In the dark water, sadly, many died,
good folk forever severed from their kin.
But when I first saw Concord on her side
my face was riven with a mighty grin.
The irony was sweet as liquorice,
the giant vessel flipped by some diabolus,
a painting called The Sack of Sybaris
or Shipwreck of the Sardanapalus.
Rise, Habakkuk, I have a job for thee!
Bewail obesity of wealth, appal
us with the idlers’ stark depravity,
the crime of pissing fortunes on the wall.
No, I’m ashamed. I’m kinder by a mile
than that. (Remove the picture or I’ll smile.)
Dunc
So much neatly-crafted humour. You lift metre and rhyme and *funny* from 'light' to serious, and your short lines are a geek's joy.
ReplyDeleteSo, lots and lots of NaPo fluff,
but the honest, heartfelt stuff.
Hy.
G'Day Dunc! so happy to see you found your way here! and such wonderful new poems! you slay me, over and over again...
ReplyDeleteDunc! Sorry PFFA has keeled over; glad I still get to read your poems.
ReplyDelete"Song" is a tune that I can drink to! Balls to sorrow, amen! (Has the form got a name, by the way?)
"Glagolitsa": what an alphabet. (It does look sort of bubbly, too, now that I think of it.) Yum. I particularly like the word "beefy" for calf-bound volumes.
I thought "Costa Concordia" was going to get all grave and moralistic on me, and really enjoyed the self-deprecating ending.
P.S. Hope it's all right that I removed your font formatting. It was showing up so tiny that it was driving me nuts.
ReplyDelete