beerdy beard

[tim slum]

there did spring
gnarley crops of hops and barley
that do doodle about the earthy burrows
of my rabbit foot face
snared between the twisted rungs of my beanstalk ladder

nine years diddled away on the roof
have haggled me out of my
childhood daze
allowing mealy thoughts to ooze past
my expired pious filter

like how the shroud of a black pint of draught
drawn in the morning
through charcoal strands
of hand-rolled lilly-pad tobacco
lends strength
to the lick
of my alcoholic tongue
lapping upside your head
and retracting back past the bristles
of my sweeping push-broom beard

I am a big hairy, soul-eating heathen
perched atop this soapbox like a gargoyle
spitting out the reigns of
Gods filthy fallacy from my hardened lips

but, as I lay here
lathered in his soiling spume
crumpled into a broken heap of dirt whore
aching for one more comfort suck
off his sour soother
shame
pools in my matted lip-locks
like a premature beer

until a lone wolf
suckling at the swollen breast of the moon
is realized in faded fabric paint
spilling down the front of my t-shirt

admittedly,
not quite the flawless withdrawal
of gnawing off one's
own paw
from the jagged jaw line
of a Jesus clamp
yet,
somehow more me
than mor-mon

I shear of this sheep suit
that baptized me into eternal debt
to his majesty
the clockwork carpenter
only to bare my un-plum construction
proudly
like a drunken hobo
ready to die
happily homeless in the ever hereafter

[k-j]

Hello - this is a bit different. Excellent, in my opinion. The language abuse is supple, funny, pungent, pugnacious. It's damn hard to write like this without sounding wankerish - so well done.

I love the mock-poetic tone at the start. Now I read it again and it's hilarious - "big hairy, soul-eating heathen" - and the fairy tales are worked-in perfectly. I like the way you dip into the idioms of religion and fable with your great big hairy dirty hands.

I read a novel called "Ferdydurke" by a Pole called Gombrowicz, and this reminds of that more than of anything else. Fantastic impiety.

Feature please moderators.

[TDF]

tim,

Gonna be a bit of a brief crit this, since by and large I like it as it is. Really enjoyed your choice of language, the flow and the images they create especially. However, I did feel at times it became a bit too vague. Think maybe it could do with a little bit of cropping/tweaking to sharpen parts up a touch to keep my interest.

great stuff though.
Tom

[David]

Wow. This is very good. A nice sort of Bukowski - Flann O'Brien - Stanley Unwin groove. If you know what I mean, and I'm sure you do.

Feature? Well, I'm not saying no. Any more for any more?

I don't believe that name, though. I mean, who, nowadays, is actually called Tim?

Cheers

David

[CybaSumo]

nice poem! i read it in my nephew's bedtime, and he really loved it!!!

[barrie]

I've been going over this since it was posted, trying to decide (remember) who it reminded me of. I've been through my books, searched the net, read the comments and I still can't say. It sounds like a blend of Joyce, Lear and Carroll.

I was impressed by the opening verse, the first two lines in particular. I thought we were going to be subject to another venture into past poetic diction when I read the opening line -

there did spring - but I was quickly put straight

gnarley crops of hops and barley - great line. From then on it was a trip into the language - fascinating.

I fear that you may be subjected to the bell, book and candle for your reference to -

his majesty
the clockwork carpenter, and the final hint at disbelief in in the ever hereafter.

Excellent - Something worth reading over and over.

Do I also detect a hint of Rabelais - Gargantua and Pantagruel? Or is my memory playing tricks (again).

Barrie

"We separate him, together with his accomplices and abettors, from the precious body and blood of the Lord and from the society of all Christians; we exclude him from our Holy Mother, the Church in Heaven, and on earth; we declare him excommunicate and anathema; we judge him damned, with the Devil and his angels and all the reprobate, to eternal fire until he shall recover himself from the toils of the devil and return to amendment and to penitence."

That's what the apprentice carpenters will utter...then the bell be will rung, the candle put out, and the book dropped to the floor......

[Oskar]

This is EXCELLENT and has surely got to be a feature.

I immediately thought of Lewis Carroll's 'Jabberwocky' - T'was brillig and the slithy toves... and Rambling Syd Rumpo's, 'The Ballad of the Woggler's Moulie'.There's also that venal undercurrent that gives the whole thing a disturbing edge. Nimble wordage, Sir.

This one had me nadgers bogglin'... and the Venerable Barrie is right - you're for the drop!

BTW My dad wasn't a smoker but, following family tradition, he'd always light up a tim slum cigar after he'd eaten his Christmas dinner. Always threw up immediately afterwards as well!

[twoleftfeet]

Tim,

It sounds like a painful extrication - I hope you still have all your appendages..

I love the pseudo-Bible-babble beginning, and S1, S2 and the penultimate stanza are top-notch.
Some bits, though (notably S3) were a little OTT for me, even though you are portraying a drunken rant
(That's what my drunken rants are like, anyway)

The only suggestion I can make is
wrt "Jesus clamp"
- do clamps have sharp edges? Howzabout "trap" ?
Great image, though

Nice work
Geoff
btw have you heard "GOD LOVES A DRUNK" by Richard Thompson?

[tim slum]

First off, thanks everyone for the positive feedback. Occasionally I find myself at the poetryslam, and I never fair too well there. Anyway, to answer David, you are right, tim slum is not my name (not even close) but I liked the ring and i allways wanted a stage name. To TDF and twoleftfeet, yes, I know stanza three is a bit of a beer rant, but i love beer especially the creamy black guinness and what's a pint without a drum smoking in the other hand and i love my beard too and writing poetry and i just wanted to put them all together at the same time so that i could try to attain the greatest moment of my life and then write it down on paper. sorry, its just so easy to rant about beer.
But the stanza with the wolf, I know, is a bit of a stretch. I spent an embarrasing amount of time trying to work that in. I knew I wanted to "sheer off my sheep suit" so I needed a wolf. The only thing I could come up with was one of those wolf shirts (that seem to be making it "back" into style) and I liked the image of the howling wolf "suckling at the breast of the moon". But if it's confusing I am up for suggestions. Also, thanks for pointing out the "clamp" problem. That part just flowed out in one moment and I never stoped to think about it. I am in the midst of fixing.
To Barrie, I feel a bit foolish admiting I had never heard of the bell the candle and the book before but after a fine lesson from wiki, I thank thee for the damnation. Rabelais was a new one for me too, I read a little on-line, and I'm sold.
To k-j, if Gombrowicz is as brutaly atheist as Rabelais I am excited. I will definatley check it out.
And to Oskar I must check out Rambling Syd Rumpo, the ballad of the woggler's moulie. Are those even words?

[TDF]

To TDF and twoleftfeet, yes, I know stanza three is a bit of a beer rant, but i love beer especially the creamy black guinness and what's a pint without a drum smoking in the other hand and i love my beard too and writing poetry and i just wanted to put them all together at the same time so that i could try to attain the greatest moment of my life and then write it down on paper.

haha I think that sentence itself reflects the thoughts and approach really quite well.
Tom