(based on suggestions from @jellyjellyfish, @facelikethunder, @kenrob2037, @ernmalleyscat)
Wolves live in the walls.
They were bricked up, trapped
here before we moved in
At night I hear their fur brush against
hard mortar between pavers
and sharp backs of picture hooks.
And harks back to picture books
Wild dogs illustrate our halls,
page their way round struts, navigate
hardbacked trenches as soldiers.
They recoil rows of teeth
Muzzles are loaded like cast paydays.
Puzzles are coded like last maydays
they are cryptic behind terracotta
We’ve hung black and white paintings
to cover their canine crosswords.
Our companions are odorous:
sniff out their clues, let slip the dogs.
________________________________________
Today's poem is based on suggestions from four peeps:
- @jellyjellyfish: “wolves”
- @kenrob2037: “poems about paintings”
- @facelikethunder: “The technical features of the German WWI 25cm minenwerfer”
- @ernmalleyscat: “malapropisms and spoonerisms”
Ok. Here's the nitty-gritty:
Words related to features of the German WWI 25cm minenwerfer feature in the first and second stanza.
The last/first lines of stanzas 1 & 2 and 2 & 3 are attempts at spoonerisms of each other that still make sensible words (the first isn't completely spoonered, I know). It's hard!
There are vague references to famous malaproprisms (excuse no links, I'm really tired):
"Our companions are odorous" (instead of odious) is from Much Ado About Nothing.
Del Boy from Only Fools and Horses said "Good to be back on the old terracotta" (instead of terra firma)
I know it's a bit creepy, but I've always liked the idea that something lives in the space between the walls. We used to have rats in the ceiling when I lived in Hopetoun Road in Warrnambool. Once we heard one of them run across the ceiling, then there was a descending "EEEEEEEE!" as it fell down between the walls, then a thump, then silence. Then a scrambling noise ran under the floor beneath us.
Imagine if there were wolves in our walls.
5 comments:
That's great, and really clever.
The spoonered lines are great even on their own, but the mirrors across the stanza breaks are brilliant.
I like all the other echos, maybe accidental, like pavers and terracotta, picture hooks and paintings, dogs and wolves etc.
One of my favourites.
Wonderful!
None of the echoes you mentioned were accidental, I just never know if anyone notices except me :)
weird, was just writing a song with the first lines "rats in the streets, mice in the walls".
Very good, and very clever. I'm a poet and I don't understand some of this, but that's normal. I don't understand some of the things I compose.
Creepy but soft and feminine if I might add. Perhaps you should trademark this idea, it is similar to some of things I was taught, association and such, but you have done a great job. Are you published? And have you tried verse prose, or straight prose? Cheers Rob
Thanks Rob :)
I haven't got a book of poetry published, but I've had single poems published in places like Wet Ink, Overland, The Age, Quadrant, Verandah, etc.
Which idea do you mean, trademark wise? ;)
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