The Oldie 'Suspense' Competition by 7th March
 

I've never heard of Breaking Bad but it doesn't matter; 'Suspense' is a topic with plenty of scope -- Gosh, I can hardly wait to see what you all come up with! ;)

Jayne

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxThe Oldie Competition
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxby Tessa Castro

COMPETITION NO 174

I’ve noticed that the American series called Breaking Bad employs the same kind of suspense that Hitchcock used. Please write a poem called Suspense, either light or serious, on any subject that fits. Maximum 16 lines.

Entries to ‘Competition No 174’ by post (The Oldie, 65 Newman Street, London W1T 3EG), fax (020 7436 8804) or email comps@theoldie.co.uk by 7th March 2014.

Hooray for poems!

xxxxxxxxxxSuspense

North by Northwest? I took the wrong direction,
And now I’m stuck on this absurd projection.
Suspended by my fingernails and toes,
I’m hanging on to Lincoln’s massive nose.
“I’m just an English visitor from Taunton”,
I tell the bad guys, “I’m not Roger Thornton!”
“You’re not?” the leader says suspiciously.
“Then tell us, wise guy, where the f— is he?”
I’d gladly tell them what they want to know -
Perhaps they’d very kindly let me go -
But Thornton’s role was played by Cary Grant,
Who died decades ago, and so I can’t.
I’m waiting for the good guys to arrive,
As in the film, and get me out alive.
I hope it’s soon - the wind is chilling me,
And frankly, the suspense is killing me.

That's terrific, Brian, but I for one will not be making you any rash promises about hats.

True story, but probably too macabre for the competition

They found his body hanging from a hook –
A suicide the day they did the wages.
It seems the auditors were due to look
At Tom’s accounts in search of all the pages
His wife suspected he was prone to cook.
She told them‘He’d been in suspense for ages’.

Jerome, you should enter your chilling poem for the comp; they do occasionally go for shorter and more serious items once in a way and this should be one such occasion.

I agree with Rob and, after eating an entire straw boater, I won't be making any more rash promises (to anyone) about hats either! :o

Jayne

Brian, Jerome... good 'uns!


Spent cables of the bridge sing Twang!
The wind knifes, keening, through their harp;
Flood-waters surge below. Rocks sharp
Hunger, with many a fang.
My car slides nearer ruptured edge;
Crazed headlights saw this fear-drenched night -
It screams, falls - black roil snuffs their light.
Alone, clutching the ledge
Of skewed bridge rampart, I breathe - just -
Though gusts yet wrestle every breath
With tugs that taunt of looming death.
Can I hold on? I must!
By inch, intent on inch, I grasp;
Toes, fingers, sinews: life and hope…
A soul-change finds me nigh bank’s slope -
Lie prone - how dearly, gasp!


I originally began L8 'Behind' then opted for 'Alone'. Is that better? Might 'Above' be better still?
L8 'Can I hold on?' doesn't completely satisfy me. Too trite, or do such simple words befit the situation? I'm also considering 'Will I still hold?'
Thanks in advance for any comments offered.

This needs a bit of work still. Suggestions welcome.

My silhouetted form, obese and bald,
Attended by that fruity London slur
Secured my fame worldwide. I have been called
The cinema’s pre-eminent auteur,
Epitomising what François Truffaut
Respected most; an individual voice,
Original and clear. I ran the show:
Found scripts myself, approved each casting choice,
Stamped Hitchcock style on everything in frame.
Uninterested in romantic plots,
Still less in jokes, I found that I became
Preoccupied with thrillers. I made lots:
Each year I put fresh crimes on celluloid,
Notched up another guiltless man to test,
Stuck in a blonde he should (but won't) avoid
Et cetera. It’s what I did the best.

Nice, Rob. I would remove Hitchcock from the poem itself and not capitalize the initial letters of each line, thus leaving he reader something to do.

Good one, Rob, although I don't think it's true to say that Hitchcock wasn't interested in jokes - there are plenty of them, especially in The Lady Vanishes.

I disagree with John about the capitals. Without them, it's all too easy to fail to spot the acrostic.

Thank you gentlemen. There are jokes in Hitchcock, it's true, but I was trying to suggest that he wasn't particularly attracted to comedy as a genre. He did try once - 'Mr and Mrs Smith', and pretty dire it is too.

The Trouble With Harry is a comedy, & so in my book is North By North West, a sophisticated satire of the Cold War spy movie. How can you be sure not to kill an unarmed man who is standing alone by the side of a deserted road? Hire a crop-dusting plane. Plus of course Psycho is one long Oedipal joke.

Yes it is more difficult to spot it. That was my point, Brian. 'North by Northwest', one of my favourites, is indeed extremely funny, and though I can't say I fell about when I first saw 'Psycho', it is indeed as Bazza says. There are jokes in a lot of Hitchcock's films.

Another draft it is, then.

Great one, Rob - I would suggest capitalize but not in bold...

Well, well. I knew it was overtly oedipal but I didn't realise it was a piss-take. Did anyone see the BBC4 programme about film music? He wanted the shower scene to take place in silence, no music. So... there goes the most famous clip of film music ever. Hitch, at a later date, showed his gratitude by sacking the composer.

That is what I meant, Sylvia. Not, I agree, what I said, but what I meant.

Twitching basket case & keen taxidermist Norman Bates is given lines like 'A boy's best friend is his mother' & 'Mother isn't herself tonight'. 'Mother' yells at Norman ''You put me in the fruit cellar. You think I'm fruity, do you?' (he does). A woman named Crane finds herself surrounded by stuffed birds. Hitchcock verging on Beckett, the doyen of dark humourists.

I never find Hitchcock films funny but there's a lugubrious oddness in many of them which makes me uneasy. He was fond of practical jokes (sadism by other means) which means he can't have been remotely pleasant.

My silhouetted form, obese and bald,
Augmented by a fruity English slur
Secured me worldwide fame. I have been called
The cinema’s pre-eminent auteur,
Epitomising what François Truffaut
Respected most; an individual voice,
Original and bold. I ran the show:
Found scripts to film, approved each casting choice,
Saw to it every picture’s mise-en-scène
Upheld the mood I wanted. I was fond,
So very fond, of having guiltless men
Plus pretty women (preferably blonde)
Entangled in intrigues. I played on doubt,
Not payoffs, as I regularly stressed.
Surprise is not what drama is about.
Explosions blow it; ticking bombs are best...

It's a pity that the plural would spoil the rhyme, otherwise line 12 might have had a pleasing (and truthful) double-entendre as:

(And fonder still of having pretty blondes) ...

I'm still not sure that the last three lines are as good as the rest, nor that a competition judge in a hurry will spot the acrostic without the bold typeface.

I'm still working on it. It's nowhere near as good as it should be considering the time I've spent. Acrostics are a bloody pain-I shall try and remember that in future.

Ooops! Yes, when I suggested that line, I had already forgotten the acrostic requirement.

I know, Rob. Try anagrams - call it idiotic loopiness!


(Oh, blast! You changed your original post while I was working on the above. Well, I'm not starting again!)

Brian, I think that your friends in the Sphere are going to have to stage an intervention and cart you off to Anagrams Anonymous.

Modest of you, Rob; but I can't see any way to improve it, myself!
(By which of course I mean that it's terrific - not bad beyond rescue!)

You're very kind, Graham, but I'm really not so sure.

Well... looking at your latest version, now I might suggest inserting a comma after 'intrigues' in L13, and in L16 having a semi-colon rather than the comma.
To me, it seems that would ease reading of it, especially on first sight.

Thank you Graham, I think you're absolutely right. I've never been very good on the usage of colons and semi-colons. This is what you get for going to drama school instead of a proper university, I'm afraid to say.

You mean the inane moths twice? Sorry, that should be the men in white coats.

You're a silent camera, Brian. Dammit, terminal case.

:cool:Teaching punctuation is – or used to be – the province of the primary & secondary schools.

I was raised by wolves.

You were lucky.

It could have been hippopotami.

Yes, John... I think one would tend to get flattened by hippopotamuses, rather than be raised by them.

So to paraphrase you, Rob Stuart, what you may be saying is
(Sob!) Art... rut! or perhaps Art: sub-rot?

Suspense
 

This tension I feel’s not my belt;
That’s sliding down. In both my hands,
Is crockery; no table near;
Mid-room, quick dread I’ve felt.
Broad daylight; window wide and clean;
I splay my legs to stay the drift
To floor of trousers off my rump;
I fear much may be seen
That I would rather keep in check
(Or corduroy, or plaid, or plain);
If I should stoop to lay cups down,
Garb sooner’d hit the deck.
For just as shoes require laces
To ensure they keep their grip
So now my paunch (ampler than hip)
Sheds trews. I may need braces.

They can't punctuate at lots of 'proper' universities either. The young today... tut, tut!

There is a book called 'Mind the Stop'.I bet you can still buy it. Penguin I think.

You can always use a full stop instead of a semi-colon and you can live good life and never use a colon at all. Nevertheless...

Yes, John, a Pelican by G.V. Carey 1971. He calls the comma ' the most ubiquitous, elusive, and discretionary of all stops'. Glad about the 'discretionary' Get Out Of Jail card.