Poetry Forum

In a lonely ditch with a nagging bitch
domestication overcame me ...

My sad eyed lady of the lowlands.

Half-cut, leaning in the breeze,
woozy, wobbly at the knees,
bouncing off occasional trees, losing
the run of meself, oh! oh! oh!
falling down, entirely:

this matter of getting home.

I went to the Pisgah convention
all along the oul' red lane
with stout Cortez, an eagle of a man,
agus son amigo, gaunt Pissaro,
goggle-eyed, gazing, single
minded, Darien-blinded,
down from the Hill of Howth.

We were
half-cut, leaning leftwards,
leaning and linking serenely,
gliding, colliding, sliding,
all over the flushed and happy faces
of the multitude; they were singing
loud and lustily, lovingly
their anthem for the races:

There were four and twenty virgins
at the Ball of Inverness.
And when the ball was over
there were four and twenty less!

And in another corner of a foreign field
young Jimmy the Bollix and Gaston Grey
languished lazily
among langourous lilacs,
gesticulating, interpolating,
Wolfsbane
Sinn Fein
and fifty feckin reasons
to kill your mam
and love your dad.

The only peace I ever had
was seven past mental
alone in the flat in Islandbridge.
But with two suns in a blazing sky
fast closing in, approaching,
there was this ... apprehension,
this uncertain certainty
of permanent impermanence.

And I thought (that was then)
Mr Death was not worth dying for.
Like any sensible man
I was all for a bit of silence,
I was all for tea and tobacco
and periodic hesitation
in the face of the normal, relentless
working drag.

Five pints and an awkward stand-up shag

But, Jayz, Mr D went a step too far
in the other direction. Beyond
them gallows you may discern
and even, if unlikely, learn
the psychological centre
of the unhealthy happy human mind:
pre- Catholic
pre- Communist
pre-Fascist
pre- American
prelapsarian ....

as when in days of innocent youth
we laughed with girls and told the truth.

Allow me, if you will,
to place some interpretation
upon your scalp.
Clocks are mechanical,
they are relentless and inhuman,
and we are not clocks:
we don't just tick tick tick on
with a dull clang on the stroke of eleven.
Although I have not been up to Heaven
allow me, please,
to rub this in with kneading fingers:
our needs are real
our needs still linger.

Ded,

I was much taken with this stanza:

But, Jayz, Mr D went a step too far
in the other direction. Beyond
them gallows you may discern
and even, if unlikely, learn
the psychological centre
of the unhealthy happy human mind:
pre- Catholic
pre- Communist
pre-Fascist
pre- American
prelapsarian ....

-although I am struggling to reconcile unhealthy with happy.

I take it you have a low opinion of psychia-trick-cyclists?

I like the clock/mechanical brain analogy, although in these days of
anti-depressants-for-kids maybe a bio-chemical analogy would be more
accurate (if I could think of one....)

Incidentally I googled "seven past mental" and got a reference to the
SEVEN DAY MENTAL DIET - Truly, we are what we eat

Nice one
Geoff

A joy to read. The part that stuck out the most for me was the way it read - it flowed, but never felt frivolous. The alliteration, assonance and colloquialism helped immensely and gave the first 'part' of the poem a sliding air of excellence.

My first concern appears in the start of the consideration part.
While
this uncertain certainty
of permanent impermanence.
gets what you need it to across and slows down the ryhthm, it feels too self-conscious. All of the little techniques mentioned earlier don't, they fly with the poem, this is appears too deliberate for my liking.

The deconstruction into something simple in the "But, Jayz" stanza is well exexcuted. Is that simplicity what arises after death and beyond the gallows? Or at the bottom of our minds? I couldn't quite work it out. The italics after give the statement some life and some context which I think is really well done.

My only problem is the last stanza. I think, at times, it's awkward. The didacticism in the beginning works, but I don't think the rest does. The clock conceit is too detached and too sudden, it feels almost meaningless and out of context of the rest of the poem. Perhaps it's how the line starts:
Clocks are mechanical,
gives the impression that clocks have been mentioned throughout the poem (I recall only small glimpses of the idea - particularly in the title). I'd think a mention of 'we' and then the clock would be a better way to break the image in. Otherwise it sticks out and is a bit too sudden.
Also, the final two lines, while giving the real meaning to the poem (that works within the context of the rest considering Death, dull work, the jubilant beginning, and sparse death) is again too much of a jump. It, like the clock, seems detached and clincal and doesn't fit in with the richness of the rest of the poem. I would suggest trying to tackle this truth in a more slanted, more ambiguous way. But then that may remove power from the conclusion, so don't take my word for it.

This poems exudes virtuosity at points, especially the scattered beginning stanzas, but the concluding stanza doesn't sit comfortably with me.

I hope all of that helps.

Dave

Thanks, lads. This thing is all over the place. I'll try to respond in more detail soon. I appreciate the comments.

Is Mise,
dedalus

I give up. Sorry. I don't know how to start explaining this thing. Just try to imagine you are Irish-born, living in a squat in Dublin, between 23-26, estranged from your family, fairly well-educated but totally unemployed, dabbling in drugs, lonely, aggressive, vulnerable and ferocious. No, this is not in the least bit autobiographical. So what if it were: it's just something I came across in my travels and made note of. It's a Dublin thing from the late 90s. All the jackeens (Dublin geezers) reading this know immediately what's going on here. Dubbalin Town is what's going on. Check out Damien Dempsey on iTunes -- he's the modern bard of our amazingly captivating and sleek and smooth and also rough and decidedly dangerous capital city. I was thinking of explaining, but gave up -- where to start? Baile Atha Cliath Abú.

Well then it's probably a compliment to say that that was almost spot on to the feeling I got from it.

You're a fine writer in the Irish tradition Dedalus. This is a roller coaster of a read and I suspect, as usual, extempore. An example to us all. Wish I had half your love of literature.

Sebastian Balfe Dangerfield is my favourite anti-hero, you write very much in the Donleavy style. (although the man was american)

Again

Would love to read some introspective stuff, if not, keep posting the anti- biographical stuff. Uplifting in a Dirty Dublin kind of way.

Aw, Jayz. Compliments do be welcome but hard to take in. Truly. There's the rarity value. You might want to poke about below for the Full Monty, going back to the archives: http://dublinerinjapan.blogspot.com

Slán anois,
dedalus

Dedalus,

I admit to struggling with "long" poems, my fault entirely, severe lack of concentration issues, but I must say a voice is being formed and it's your own, which can only be a good thing!

I may even comment on the next one, if only the words would stop blurring around the fifth stanzas.

Cheers
Kris

O, the strangled squawks of a would-be nightingale .... !!

I'll say, as least patronisingly as one can:

"Keep Posting"

You realize, of course, I was thrown off my last three poetry lists? Marched to the border by Internal Security and told to keep walking? I still can't quite figure ... must be something I said ... such as "half of yez couldn't write your way out of a paper bag". Well, it was distressingly true. And I was provoked.

I like the "Graves". It's normal. People write poems, some of them exceptionally good, and we talk back and forth. There's an air of tolerance and nobody thinks about throwing hissy fits. I like the atmosphere and plan to stick around if that's OK. You write bloody well yourself when you put your mind to it, Kris, and that's a true bill. Why would I say it otherwise? It's like being back on a rugby team that wins most of its matches, esprit de corps, I don't know ... although God knows writing a truly good poem is a lonely bloody occupation. Never mind, I have lots of stinkers.

All the best,
dedalus/ Brendan

Jeez

Marched to the border by Internal Security and told to keep walking?

What's it like on the edge of cyberspace? Is it flat, with streams of binary code casading off the edges?

We still loves ya - sheesh!

Dave

Ah, would you get lost, Davey? Go write a bloody poem. Sheesh.

Ban him, the insolent fool.

How dare he tell you to "get lost"

We are all slightly lost, that's why we're here.