The Drunken Fisherman
Wallowing in this bloody sty,
I cast for fish that pleased my eye
(Truly Jehovah’s bow suspends
No pots of gold to weight its ends);
Only the blood-mouthed rainbow trout
Rose to my bait. They flopped about
My canvas creel until the moth
Corrupted its unstable cloth.
A calendar to tell the day;
A handkerchief to wave away
The gnats; a couch unstuffed with storm
Pouching a bottle in one arm;
A whiskey bottle full of worms;
And bedroom slacks: are these fit terms
To mete the worm whose molten rage
Boils in the belly of old age?
Once fishing was a rabbit’s foot
O wind blow cold, O wind blow hot,
Let suns stay in or suns step out:
Life danced a jig on the sperm-whale’s spout
The fisher’s fluent and obscene
Catches kept his conscience clean.
Children, the raging memory drools
Over the glory of past pools.
Now the hot river, ebbing, hauls
Its bloody waters into holes;
A grain of sand inside my shoe
Mimics the moon that might undo
Man and Creation too; remorse,
Stinking, has puddled up its source;
Here tantrums thrash to a whale’s rage.
This is the pot-hole of old age.
Is there no way to cast my hook
Out of this dynamited brook?
The Fisher’s sons must cast about
When shallow waters peter out.
I will catch Christ with a greased worm,
And when the Prince of Darkness stalks
My bloodstream to its Stygian term. . .
On water the Man-Fisher walks.
Related poetry:
- THE FISHERMAN THE waters rush’d, the waters rose, A fisherman sat by, While on his line in calm repose He cast his patient eye. And as he sat, and hearken’d there, The flood was cleft in twain, And, lo! a dripping mermaid fair Sprang from the troubled main. She sang to him, and spake the while: “Why […]...
- Whales Weep Not! They say the sea is cold, but the sea contains The hottest blood of all, and the wildest, the most urgent. All the whales in the wider deeps, hot are they, as they urge On and on, and dive beneath the icebergs. The right whales, the sperm-whales, the hammer-heads, the killers There they blow, there […]...
- The Fisherman Although I can see him still. The freckled man who goes To a grey place on a hill In grey Connemara clothes At dawn to cast his flies, It’s long since I began To call up to the eyes This wise and simple man. All day I’d looked in the face What I had hoped […]...
- Fisherman jim's kids Fisherman Jim lived on the hill With his bonnie wife an’ his little boys; ‘T wuz “Blow, ye winds, as blow ye will – Naught we reck of your cold and noise!” For happy and warm were he an’ his, And he dandled his kids upon his knee To the song of the sea. Fisherman […]...
- How M'Ginnis went missing Let us cease our idle chatter, Let the tears bedew our cheek, For a man from Tallangatta Has been missing for a week. Where the roaring flooded Murray Covered all the lower land, There he started in a hurry, With a bottle in his hand. And his fate is hid for ever, But the public […]...
- Poet As Fisherman I fish for words To say what I fish for, Half-catch sometimes. I have caught little pan fish flashing sunlight (yellow perch, crappies, blue-gills), Lighthearted reeled them in, Filed them on stringers on the shore. A nice mess, we called them, And ate with our fingers, laughing. Once, dreaming of fish in far-off waters, I […]...
- Ford o' Kabul River Kabul town’s by Kabul river Blow the bugle, draw the sword There I lef’ my mate for ever, Wet an’ drippin’ by the ford. Ford, ford, ford o’ Kabul river, Ford o’ Kabul river in the dark! There’s the river up and brimmin’, an’ there’s ‘arf a squadron swimmin’ ‘Cross the ford o’ Kabul river […]...
- To the Bottle I Go Ho! Ho! Ho! To the bottle I go To heal my heart and drown my woe. Rain may fall and wind may blow, And many miles be still to go But under a tall tree I will lie, And let the clouds go sailing by....
- John Rouat the Fisherman Margaret Simpson was the daughter of humble parents in the county of Ayr, With a comely figure, and face of beauty rare, And just in the full bloom of her womanhood, Was united to John Rouat, a fisherman good. John’s fortune consisted of his coble, three oars, and his fishing-gear, Besides his two stout boys, […]...
- 24. Song-No Churchman am I NO churchman am I for to rail and to write, No statesman nor soldier to plot or to fight, No sly man of business contriving a snare, For a big-belly’d bottle’s the whole of my care. The peer I don’t envy, I give him his bow; I scorn not the peasant, though ever so low; […]...
- The Ditch is dear to the Drunken man The Ditch is dear to the Drunken man For is it not his Bed His Advocate his Edifice? How safe his fallen Head In her disheveled Sanctity Above him is the sky Oblivion bending over him And Honor leagues away....
- A Drunken Man's Praise Of Sobriety Come swish around, my pretty punk, And keep me dancing still That I may stay a sober man Although I drink my fill. Sobriety is a jewel That I do much adore; And therefore keep me dancing Though drunkards lie and snore. O mind your feet, O mind your feet, Keep dancing like a wave, […]...
- The bottle tree A bottle tree bloometh in Winkyway land – Heigh-ho for a bottle, I say! A snug little berth in that ship I demand That rocketh the Bottle-Tree babies away Where the Bottle Tree bloometh by night and by day And reacheth its fruit to each wee, dimpled hand; You take of that fruit as much […]...
- Drunken Memories Of Anne Sexton The first and last time I met My ex-lover Anne Sexton was at A protest poetry reading against Some anti-constitutional war in Asia When some academic son of a bitch, To test her reputation as a drunk, Gave her a beer glass full of wine After our reading. She drank It all down while staring […]...
- Willow Poem It is a willow when summer is over, A willow by the river From which no leaf has fallen nor Bitten by the sun Turned orange or crimson. The leaves cling and grow paler, Swing and grow paler Over the swirling waters of the river As if loth to let go, They are so cool, […]...
- Schroeder the Fisherman I sat on the bank above Bernadotte And dropped crumbs in the water, Just to see the minnows bump each other, Until the strongest got the prize. Or I went to my little pasture, Where the peaceful swine were asleep in the wallow, Or nosing each other lovingly, And emptied a basket of yellow corn, […]...
- The Meditation Of The Old Fisherman You waves, though you dance by my feet like children at play, Though you glow and you glance, though you purr and you dart; In the Junes that were warmer than these are, the waves were more gay, When I was a boy with never a crack in my heart. The herring are not in […]...
- THE PEARL FISHERMAN This evening and part of the night I sank again into the dense sea Where we beings and things float. I descended for pearls to show to men Who fear even the risk of the border. This evening and part of the night I was amidst that silence, in that deepness Where the most infinite […]...
- Drinking Song, On the Excellence of Burgundy Wine My jolly fat host with your face all a-grin, Come, open the door to us, let us come in. A score of stout fellows who think it no sin If they toast till they’re hoarse, and drink till they spin, Hoofed it amain Rain or no rain, To crack your old jokes, and your bottle […]...
- Sweet And Low Sweet and low, sweet and low, Wind of the western sea, Low, low, breathe and blow, Wind of the western sea! Over the rolling waters go, Come from the dying moon, and blow, Blow him again to me; While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps. Sleep and rest, sleep and rest, Father will […]...
- Worm Either Way If you live along with all the other people And are just like them, and conform, and are nice You’re just a worm And if you live with all the other people And you don’t like them and won’t be like them and won’t conform Then you’re just the worm that has turned, In either […]...
- Gamajun, the Prophetic Bird On waters, spread without end, Dressed with the sunset so purple, It sings and prophesies for land, Unable to lift the smashed wings’ couple… The charge of Tartars’ hordes it claims, And bloody set of executions, Earthquake, and hunger and the flames, The death of justice, crime’s intrusion… And caught with fear, cold and smooth, […]...
- Bottle 'O' I ain’t the kind of bloke as takes to any steady job; I drives me bottle cart around the town; A bloke what keeps ‘is eyes about can always make a bob I couldn’t bear to graft for every brown. There’s lots of handy things about in everybody’s yard, There’s cocks and hens a-runnin’ to […]...
- Rip It can’t be the passing of time that casts That white shadow across the waters Just offshore. I shiver a little, with the evening. I turn down the steep path to find What’s left of the river gold. I whistle a dog lazily, and lazily A bird whistles me. Close by a big river, I […]...
- Ho, everyone that thirsteth Ho, everyone that thirsteth And hath the price to give, Come to the stolen waters, Drink and your soul shall live. Come to the stolen waters, And leap the guarded pale, And pull the flower in season Before desire shall fail. It shall not last for ever, No more than earth and skies; But he […]...
- Wind on the Hill No one can tell me, Nobody knows, Where the wind comes from, Where the wind goes. It’s flying from somewhere As fast as it can, I couldn’t keep up with it, Not if I ran. But if I stopped holding The string of my kite, It would blow with the wind For a day and […]...
- We are the time. We are the famous We are the time. We are the famous Metaphor from Heraclitus the Obscure. We are the water, not the hard diamond, The one that is lost, not the one that stands still. We are the river and we are that greek That looks himself into the river. His reflection Changes into the waters of the […]...
- An Apology for the Bottle Volcanic Sometimes I dip my pen and find the bottle full of fire, The salamanders flying forth I cannot but admire. It’s Etna, or Vesuvius, if those big things were small, And then ’tis but itself again, and does not smoke at all. And so my blood grows cold. I say, “The bottle held but ink, […]...
- Rondeau Redoublé I know the rules and hear myself agree Not to invest beyond this one night stand. I know your patter: in, out, like the sea. The sharp north wind must blow away the sand. Soon my supply will meet your last demand And you will have no further use for me. I will not swim […]...
- The Aim was Song Before man came to blow it right The wind once blew itself untaught, And did its loudest day and night In any rough place where it caught. Man came to tell it what was wrong: I hadn’t found the place to blow; It blew too hard the aim was song. And listen how it ought […]...
- Blow, Bugle, Blow THE splendour falls on castle walls And snowy summits old in story: The long light shakes across the lakes, And the wild cataract leaps in glory. Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying. O hark, O hear! how thin and clear, And thinner, clearer, farther going! O […]...
- LAMENT How I loathe this land of my exile, Concrete upon concrete, Steel upon steel, Glass upon glass In massed battalions And no way back. My mind moves to a far-off place To a hill-top where the wind is my succour, Its blow and howl and rage Over the springing turf and heather Calms as the […]...
- The Whale The Whale is found in seas and oceans, Indulging there in fishlike motions, But Science shows that Whales are mammals, Like Jersey cows, and goats, and camels. When undisturbed, the Whale will browse Like camels, goats, and Jersey cows, On food that satisfies its tongue, Thus making milk to feed its young. Asking no costly […]...
- TO WILLIAM E. CHANNING The pages of thy book I read, And as I closed each one, My heart, responding, ever said, “Servant of God! well done!” Well done! Thy words are great and bold; At times they seem to me, Like Luther’s, in the days of old, Half-battles for the free. Go on, until this land revokes The […]...
- Trashcan Lives the wind blows hard tonight And it’s a cold wind And I think about The boys on the row. I hope some of them have a bottle of Red. It’s when you’re on the row That you notice that Everything Is owned And that there are locks on Everything. This is the way a democracy […]...
- The Red Flower In the pleasant time of Pentecost, By the little river Kyll, I followed the angler’s winding path Or waded the stream at will, And the friendly fertile German land Lay round me green and still. But all day long on the eastern bank Of the river cool and clear, Where the curving track of the […]...
- Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light. Though wise men at their end know dark is right, Because their words had forked no lightning they Do not go gentle into that good night. Good men, the […]...
- The Whip The doubt you fought so long The cynic net you cast, The tyranny, the wrong, The ruin, they are past; And here you are at last, Your blood no longer vexed. The coffin has you fast, The clod will have you next. But fear you not the clod, Nor ever doubt the grave: The roses […]...
- To Ireland In The Coming Times Know, that I would accounted be True brother of a company That sang, to sweeten Ireland’s wrong, Ballad and story, rann and song; Nor be I any less of them, Because the red-rose-bordered hem Of her, whose history began Before God made the angelic clan, Trails all about the written page. When Time began to […]...
- Poem On His Birthday In the mustardseed sun, By full tilt river and switchback sea Where the cormorants scud, In his house on stilts high among beaks And palavers of birds This sandgrain day in the bent bay’s grave He celebrates and spurns His driftwood thirty-fifth wind turned age; Herons spire and spear. Under and round him go Flounders, […]...