En route to the taxidermist

[Bombadil]

I stumble down the dusty hall, dander
and grief making me teary-eyed he is the
picture of rigor-mortise, still warm around the
joints.

Carcasses criss across
the pathway—a protruding
Pekinese here, a bloated Bulldog
there. Dead but prevented the privilege
of decomposing, of a dignified decay.
Old body guards and best friends, now
just fur bearing shells, eccentric décor,
the loyal lobotomized, the taxidermist’s
vacuous vassals: his petrified sentinels.

It strikes me, breaching the last swath of paw
soldiers…a blinding might-as-well-be-mustard-gas
smell: Formaldehyde reeking on rotting flesh, not the
other way around.

My hackles raise, and so do his post-mortem
and turning to leave: these Vanity Jackals, the ones
that mocked my arrival, sat up and begged for normal burials.

[Thomas]

Hi Bombadil your poetry sometimes ScareS me although your imagination is very curious to say the least. A dark piece put well together especially liked this first phrase.

I stumble down the dusty hall, dander
and grief making me teary-eyed he is the
picture of rigor-mortise, still warm around the
joints.

I suppose rigor-motise is something that is allways one step behind us with no escape from...

I enjoy your work even though i think therapy might be the cure for you .... (only kidding)

Tom.

[Bombadil]

Not sure what it was that scared you...but hey, I'll take it.

I'm off to the shrink.

[unchained soul]

Hi Keith,

Excellent poem. Very dark. I'd hate to see your nightmares lol. I could read this again and again. Its fascinating. Brilliant use of alliteration and imagery. As you know I'm not an expert so I cant really give you any advice on improvement, although I doubt if there's much room for it anyway. Well done.

Rach

[lemur]

Hi Keith,

It doesn't so much scare me as make me want to bring you blankets and maybe a hot chocolate:)

I like the intensity of this one. I think the second stanza is the best (tightest). The 'loyal lobotomised' is a great phrase...makes me picture zombies.

I felt the 'might-as-well-be-mustard-gas' line was a bit out of place; seemed too conversational, casual, after the language of the stanza before.

The only other thing I stumbled over a couple of times was the punctuation in the second line ('making me teary-eyed he is the'), and the use of the colon in the last stanza - at both points I struggled a bit to make the lines keep flowing.

Was this based on a real visit?

[Bombadil]

No, it has no real base. (Oh and my nightmares read like a Hitchcockian wet-dream. Very visceral and unfortunately frequent.) I have an old cow dog who is now an elder statesman among his breed. He lost his sister this last spring and I wasn't there to bury her. She had the afternoon meeting with the syringe and a dinner date with the incinerator...I don't want that for him. I want to bury him where he was born, with his feet facing the water. I just hope I am allowed the chance. Weird, I know, but he is a good dog.

At any rate. Thanks for the critiques. By the by, the colons we're meant to grind down the pace. I like to monkey wrench my reader now and again.

Cheers,

Keith

[figure eight]

Very dark; I love it.

Perfectly executed too. I agree with Lemur: the 'loyal lobotomised' is a great line.

Figure

P.S. I think you may need help. Looking forward to seeing your next poem... in crayon.

[Bombadil]

Fig,

One of my personalities is offended, another is crying, another is sharpening a knife whilst humming, another is mocking the first two and is secretly afraid that the knife is for him.

desufnoc gnikcuf os ma i.

Argh.

Cheers,

Keith #3

[barrie]

And all the while the knife was really for stabbing Sean Kinsella in the back!

Bravo!

Anything started in public should be finished in public ? - Good excuse for betraying a trust. At least Judas did it for silver, what did you get? Maybe it's the motherfucker in you or maybe the nudist, you say. It's neither sunshine, it's the spiteful child who desperately needs to be the focus of attention - Maybe that's the reason you reply to your own posts, just to get them back to the top of the pile again!

Did you get pleasure out of that betrayal?

[pseud]

ah now we're going to have to lock another thread...

[Minstrel]

More tea anyone?

[barrie]

Thank you - Strong, one sugar, and very little milk. Don't forget to stir.

[pseud]

Coffee for me please. Thick and black. Thank you kindly

[pseud]

milk in your tea? Man... I really need to visit Europe.

[Bombadil]

Hoy barrie. No trust was betrayed, indeed I never consented to a private and misinformed lashing. In my mind, coming out of the bushes at someone is the low-browed thing. Better to air things out in public. We see all faces then. As for me...the self-absorbed little boy judas, I reply to my posts because questions are asked of me, it's polite again, in my book. Still, your analysis of me might be right. I'm quite comfortable sharpening the knife, mountain-kid that I am. I think we are of different breed, really, and I don't mean that as a cut. (No pun intended.) I've done nothing out of my morals, grey as they may be. When I was ten, I learned how to gut and dress any animal I needed to--grew up on a farm. My favorites were pigs. Smart and mean, they can bite your hand off if you're too slow. I gutted my first (all by myself) when I was twelve. There's nothing to it really. You get used to the blood and the shit and the stink. You get good at it, you start to like doing it, especially to the mean ones, the ones that bit at your friends and kids through the fence. I don't get pleasure out of betraying trusts, but I do love to butcher a nice mean pig.

Cheers dude.

[alex69williams]

Lol. I'm enjoying this.

And yes, pseud, you need to visit Europe. Tea without milk? Get it together, my friend!

al

[cameron]

Just for the record, Keith's input was not a factor in our decision to ban Sean (the first person to be banned since the forum started 18 months ago).

Sean has been a long term poster on this site and my problem with him is that he has absolutely no intention of trying to change or improve his work. He's a classic: "this is what I do and this is how I do it". Whenever his work is challenged he comes back in bold print mode to tell us about his publication record (even though he pays to have them published himself).

The whole point of this forum is to take on board criticism and try to improve. If all you want to do is showcase your stuff then this is not the place.

I really don't like having to ban people but occasionally it is necessary in order to preserve the quality of this environment.

Cheers
Cam

[barrie]

I've had my say and you've had yours. Although I cannot agree with your reasons I can accept them - If we were all of the same mind then stagnancy and entropy would be the only outcome (2nd Law of Thermodynamics, I think). We all need something to push against or to pull on(?), without them we'd never move.

Good luck.