The Speccie in Hell
 

In the Hitch Comp Jim Hayes got a hats off for his 45 titles (as well he might) and Frank Osen carried the banner for Eratosphere into the money territory. Good on him - and not for the first time surely!

The present comp has distinct possibilities.

No. 2598: L’enfer c’est...
You are invited to provide pithy definitions of hell (as many as you like but a maximum of 150 words). Entries to ‘Competition 2598’ by 28 May or email lucy@spectator.co.uk.

Way to go, Jim and Frank!

 

L'ENFER C'EST...

The place from which
a bat departs
  with legendary speed,

the place to which
all highways paved
  with good intentions lead,

the place that Milton
said the mind
  can build from heaven's bricks,

the place you visit
when your boat
  sails up the River Styx.

 

"Frank Osen" is actually a pseudonym of Bill Greenwell's. Congrats, Bill.

Good intentions crush the clover--
Paving-stones where devils dance;
Where it never freezes over
And a snowball has no chance;
Where you go when bent for leather
When there is a lot to pay;
Where high water's normal weather;
Where it is the thing you say
When you can't believe the jury
Say you won't be heaven-sent
Just to spare you women's fury
(They are being lenient!)--
Both of us in one handbasket
Hear those ever-clamourous bells.
Can we raise it in our casket?
There are many, many hells.

The Speccie Hell contains no dead,
No fires, demons, writhing limbs—
Only an existential dread
We’re all Bill Greenwell’s pseudonyms.

. . . .

Well done Frank and Jim. AND BILL !!!!!

Janet, don't forget Bill.

Wherever I go there is always Bill,
There is always Bill wherever.
For better, for worse, for good, for ill,
Wherever I go there is always Bill
And it sounds in my soul like a dentist’s drill:
What makes him so terribly clever?
Wherever I go there is always Bill,
There is always Bill wherever.

L'enfer...
c'est so unfair
que le ciel
bores you to hell.

Martin that's brilliant.

l’enfer c’est un beau traffic jam.
or pantalons which fall or tear
exhibiting your derrière
as you ascend into a tram.

Cuisine Anglaise is hell for those
whose palates, cultivated young,
are used to manging quelque chose
avec more esprit on the tongue.

L’enfer is when a pet explodes
and no one knows whose pet has sung.
Hell’s when a camion unloads,
outside your maison, tonnes of dung.

L’enfer is when, before you die
your children say you won a prize
worth millions, zut alors! you cry,
and curse them as you close your eyes.

Janet, that is brilliant. Do you know about the late Miles Kington, the populariser of franglais?

Thanks John ;-)
I think I read something many years ago. Now that you've named him I'll Google. Thanks for that. Franglais is second only to Italiese.

Janet,
Thank you for your comment and your offering--much enjoyed.

Martin

.
L’enfer c’est, almost all the time,
unlike the heat of fabled clime
where you do penance for a crime,
is worse than losing your last dime
or aging while still in your prime,
wallowing in a barnyard’s grime
or drowning in a tub of lime,
conversing with a white-faced mime
or wading though a sea of slime –
it’s more like missing the sublime
while listening to a numbing chime
for Hell’s a droning monorhyme.

.

Lasciate ogni speranza, yada yada yada....

Condemned to Speccie hell,
will my verse never rise
unto that bright green well
in Speccie paradise?


P.S. I'm outta here. I give up.

L'enfer, c'est you, c'est me
And just to make us bitchy,
they'll pipe in Lionel Ritchie.
Though levels still more ghastly
are said to play Rick Astley.

Frank

Marion, you can't just walk out of Hell!

...and as you cross the Styx,
who else but Taylor Hicks?

Bob, that one's for you!

To Frank, Upon His Telling Me I Can't Just Walk Out Of Hell

We know that Dante made it through,
with Virgil at his side.
Who's to say I couldn't too,
if Greenwell were my guide?

HELL

Hell's the fish that got away,
Hell's the ship that won't come in,
Hell's the love who did not stay,
Hell's an evil bastard's grin.

Hell's the ticket that you lost,
Hell's the physical you failed,
Hell's a promise, fingers crossed,
Hell's a ship you missed that sailed.

Hell's the heedlessness of fate,
Hell's the riddle you can't guess,
Hell's the longing you can't sate,
Hell's your enemy's success.

Hell's a heaven you can't use.
Hell's a paradise misplaced.
Hell's the wrong path that you choose.
Hell's a monumental waste.

A movie theater where you sit
'midst blabbermouths and crinkled wrappers,
a retrospective of Brad Pitt,
a six-mile line to use the crapper.

*********

Un lieu terrible to behold
fetid, foul and mucky,
from whence the bats fly out, I’m told--
I doubt I'll be as lucky.

At the risk of sounding ad hom, Marion, that's not you talking, that's Eurydice :)

At the risk of sounding like a sheepdog encourging his flock with helpful little yaps, I think you're all doing awfully well, with Roger and Sam leading the pack (a pack of sheep?). What I'm going to do I can't think. A sonnet? Humph!

As a prize gloom-monger I have to report that I have only once seen a piece of verse get published in a Speccie comp. that had not specifically invited replies in verse. This one exception was a very short piece of mine!
But I never quite forgave them for paying me less than they paid for the prose pieces. Such seems often to be all too often the lot for light versifiers, though! Monstrous injustice.

But it must be time for it to happen again. So upwards and onwards undespairingly, Eratosphericals, I say together with John. It is a comp. that can take a long time to crack. Incidentally Lighten Up Online publishes the occasional sparkling Speccie reject -- though we give no prize money. Sorry. Further monstrous injustice!

.
L’enfer c’est


Hell is the hottest spot around
where all good swingers can be found.
You might encounter an old flame
but newer flames put her to shame.
You’ll sip a drink whose swizzle stick
will start to smoke and sizzle quick.
The disco band will burn your ears –
those guys with horns have played for years.
At dinner, they will serve you well:
flambéed in wine, you’ll taste just swell.
.

l’Enfer c’est being a dodgy poet,
l'Enfer c’est, worse, you don’t know it.

l’Enfer c’est Mother prefers your ex,
l’Enfer c’est Dad, you’re gay- he suspects.

l’Enfer c’est pussy, stuck down a well,
l’Enfer c’estbeing the bat out of hell.

l’Enfer c’est the love you are losing,
l’Enfer c’est being too skint to go boozing.

l’Enfer c’est a Boy Band singing,
l’Enfer c’est your ship is sinking

l’Enfer c’est getting laid off.
l’Enfer c’est Bernie Madoff

l’Enfer c’est being out of the main herd.
l’Enfer c’est your book remaindered.

l’Enfer c’est losing the plot
l’Enfer c’est the luck you got.

l’Enver c’est your opus slighted.
l’Enver c’est your rival knighted.

l'Enfer c'est B. Fawlty
l'Enfer c'est Gene Autres

Hell is...

You're walking naked through the mall;
you're falling through the air;
you're on the stage and can't recall
your lines; you see the glare
of demon faces, raging, mad,
all coming after you:
it's every nightmare you ever had
come true.


*******


A Warm Welcome

Step lively folks, and as you enter
abandon hope and yada yada...
The boat boards here; keep to the center--
A question? Yes. He does wear Prada.

Marion, the Prada poem is very funny, though it might not fit the bill for the competition.

Yeah, Bob, I see what you mean. Not exactly a description of Hell .. although it is descriptive as kind of a mood piece, n'est-ce pas?

How 'bout these? I think the first one doesn't fit the bill, but the second one does, big time.


I think it fair to mention
I'm surely bound for heaven:
I've had no good intentions
since 1957.

*******

Hell is damnation. Hell is forever.
Hell is no chocolate. Ever. Ever.

Aw Hell...

nevermind.

Whatever I read, it is written by John,
It is written by Johnny Whitworth.
No matter what mag or zine lighted upon
Whatever I read, it is written by John,
And it makes life harder to carry on,
It makes one think: what is it worth?
Whatever I read, it is written by John,
It is written by Johnny Whitworth.

ah! Touche!

Getting out of hell
 

Let's not be Frank, but carry on,
Pretend Hell was a bore:
I'll catch you up, dear Marion,
Or wait on the bank (for Shore).

(Dante
Might have liked a Chianti,
But, after the Inferno,
A Pernod.)