A Florilegium of Tailgaters
1.
My Thinned Duchess
That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall:
My pulping her to paint has made her tall.
2.
The Fuse of Love
The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my flesh’s fiery fuse, love’s detonator.
3.
The Day before the Morning After
A sudden blow: the great wings beating still.
It’s Zeus, and I forgot to take my pill!
4.
A Son’s Revenge
They fuck you up, your mum and dad,
But he writes verse that ain’t so bad.
5.
Almighty Diction
Glory be to God for dappled things,
Contradictions every poet sings!
6.
The Rabble’s Revenge
Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We hoped that one of us would shoot that clown.
7.
Interlocker
I am one acquainted with the night,
Like Dante, who got terza rima right.
8.
The Blond Assassin
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white:
Can it be frost that makes this morning rite?
9.
All Washed Up
One day I wrote her name upon the strand.
She said, “You poets! Where’s the wedding band?”
10.
No Eden
There is a garden in her face:
Weedy, ugly, a disgrace.
11.
Love’s Limits
For God’s sake hold your tongue, and let me love:
Your cries will wake the neighbors up above!
12.
Micro Milton
Of man’s first disobedience, and the fruit
Devoured by Eve, the Serpent’s first recruit.
13.
Frost’s Fear
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white:
Did God create this creature out of spite?
14.
An Unearned Ode
Thou still unravished bride of quietness,
Unrivalled tattooed urn, will you undress?
15.
Cool Snowman
One must have a mind of winter
And a heart of spring to win her.
16.
Grave Directions
Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal,
Turn right, then left, and you will have your gal.
17.
It’s the Contrast, Stupid!
A thing of beauty is a joy forever,
But mortal ugliness must be its father.
18.
The Arts of Parts
Today we have naming of parts. Yesterday,
We had the WMDs as parts of a play.
19.
The Perfect Disguise
I wandered lonely as a cloud,
Then passed my water on a crowd.
20.-26.
Down and Dirty
A narrow Fellow in the Grass
Exposed his slim—seductive—Ass.
I’m nobody! Who are you?
“I’m somebody. Wanna screw?”
Crumbling is not an instant’s Act—
Please be patient. Use—some—Tact!
I taste a liquor never brewed—
Inebriate of air—I’m Nude!
There is a certain slant of light
To guide you left. Now—to the—Right!
I heard a Fly buzz—when I died—
Le petit mort—oh—what—a—Ride!
Wild Nights! Wild Nights!
Turn out the Lights!
1. Robert Browning
2. Dylan Thomas
3. W. B. Yeats
4. Philip Larkin
5. Gerard Manly Hopkins
6. E. A. Robinson
7. Robert Frost
8. Robert Frost
9. Edmund Spenser
10. Thomas Campion
11. John Donne
12. John Milton
13. Robert Frost
14. John Keats
15. Wallace Stevens
16. E. A. Robinson
17. John Keats
18. Henry Reed
19. William Wordsworth
20. – 26. Emily Dickinson