Tag Archives: Snakeskin

Squib: Max Gutmann, ‘Pointedly’

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Seurat completely placed his trust
in pointillism, never fussed
with other styles, for they’d have just
been pointless.

*****

For me this falls right on the border of the category I call ‘Unforgettable Nonsense’ verse – typically short, with puns or other jokes… But this isn’t strictly speaking nonsense… Yet the use of rhyme and rhythm with the wordplay makes it super easy to memorise, which is something I always enjoy. Max Gutmann declines to comment on the poem – which was first published in Snakeskin – other than to suggest I classify it as a squib. – RHL

Max Gutmann has contributed to New Statesman, Able Muse, Cricket, and other publications. His plays have appeared throughout the U.S. (see maxgutmann.com). His latest book, Finish’d!: A Pleasant Trip to Hell with Byron’s Don Juan, is forthcoming from Word Galaxy.

Photo: “Georges Seurat” by rocor is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.

David Callin, ‘Sangliers’

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It is not a forest, more a sun-
dappled woodland near the Pont du Gard,
the river fol-de-rolling merrily.
Here, where they’ve been told the wild things are,
a family, a mother and her young,
step through wild garlic till they come upon
a small ménage of wild boars, sangliers:
a mother and her young, a glade away.
Their shadows lengthened by the dappling sun,
each gives way to the other and trots on.

*****

David Callin writes: “There are no deep secrets about the poem. It’s a memory from a family holiday in 2006, and my wife’s description of the experience of this strange meeting on her return from it. It struck me strongly at the time, but I must have stored it away, because I didn’t try to turn it into a poem until nearly 20 years later. Then, as a non-metrical poem, it didn’t take, but I found it again when looking for inspiration for George’s excellent short poems Snakeskin (issue 339, May 2026). It seemed to blossom in its new form.

“This is unlike the bulk of my poems, most of which – but by no means all – arise out of the life, history and folklore of the Isle of Man, where I’ve lived all my life apart from a brief period in the 1980s when I made a bolt for freedom, first to London and then to the Netherlands. But the place has a way of reeling you back in.

“My first full book of poems, From the Nab, is essentially Manx in subject matter. There is a review of it in Light (whose editor, I see, also features in your blog). This is the link to that … https://lightpoetrymagazine.com/book-reviews-summer-25/

“If any of your readers should like a copy – and who wouldn’t, based on that review? – a simple email to me, with their postal address, would do the trick:  dcallin2bvc@gmail.com

“Other than that, I pop up in Snakeskin from time to time – as often as I can, really. And occasionally in other places.”

*****

The image features a wild boar (Sus scrofa) with its piglets, commonly known as humbugs due to their striped appearance. 

Joe Crocker, ‘A one-way visit’

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to the vet with our decrepit cat:
snaggle-toothed, arthritic, ectoparasitic.
His kick-ass piebald coat is now a mat
for fleas to wipe their feet on.

His legs are lame. His dignity is flat.
He used to know his name was Tipperary.
Today it could be Tom or even Jerry.
Enough. He’s had enough.
And that is that.

*****

Joe Crocker writes: “Tipper” was my youngest daughter’s cat. He had white socks and a white tip to his black tail. “Tipperary” seemed like a fitting formalisation for his vaccination record. (And somewhere in my head was TS Eliot’s “The Naming of Cats”.) I don’t suppose Tipper ever really knew our name for him. In his final weeks he looked utterly bewildered and certainly unable to “keep up his tail perpendicular, spread out his whiskers or cherish his pride.”

‘A One-way Visit’ was originally published in Snakeskin.

Brief biography of Joe Crocker (masculine/feminine/neutered)

He writes his stuff and slides it under doors.
His age and sex, his fantasies, are no concern of yours.

The rhymes reflect his humour — down to earth.
A pamphlet is forthcoming but refuses to come fearth.

Winner of the Awkward Prize, ham-fisted.
Never short- or long- but  sometimes black- or shopping-listed.

Nominated (pusher) for the pushcart.
Squawking from the slush pile, self-regarding little upstart.

Google says he’s one of Sheffield’s legends
— a rock star who gets by with little help from friends, well… ex-friends.

*****

Photo: “Portrait of a Very Old Cat” by sjrankin is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.

Tom Vaughan, ‘Stuff Happens’

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Bad stuff happens.
Some survive
but it’s a risky business
being alive.

Good stuff happens
too – though don’t
count on it lasting
long. It won’t.

*****

Tom Vaughan writes: “Stuff Happens was of course part of a remark by US Secretary of Defense/Defence Donald Rumsfeld in 2003 in response to widespread looting in Baghdad following the US/US military ‘intervention’. Although I wrote the poem on the eve of the current war in the Middle East, it was intended as a more general comment on what a long-ago Roman called the nature of things, in personal as much as in global affairs.”

‘Stuff Happens’ was first published in Snakeskin.

Tom Vaughan is not the real name of a poet whose previous publications include a novel and three poetry pamphlets (A Sampler, 2010, and Envoy, 2013, both published by HappenStance; and Just a Minute, 2024, from Cyberwit). His poems have been published in a range of poetry magazines, including several of the Potcake Chapbooks and frequently in Snakeskin and Lighten Up Online. He currently lives in Brittany.
https://tomvaughan.website

Photo: “Stuff Happens” by Chris Piascik is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

D.A. Prince, ‘Dawn Chorus’

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That first sound splintering the listening dark,
letting the light slip in between the notes —
a blackbird, surely, surer now, his spark
picked up by robins. Liquid tuning floats
through unseen branches, marking territories
of nests and mating, brings the grudging air
its first flushed streak of colour. In the trees
a strengthening music, patterned like a prayer.

*****

D.A. Prince writes: “By a happy coincidence Snakeskin published ‘Dawn Chorus’ on International Dawn Chorus Day  —  the first Sunday in May when the early morning birdsong, (and every bird’s aim to establish territory and seduce a potential mate) is at its peak. You need to be awake early to hear it. I was out just after 5 a.m today and could pick out the differing songs of blackbird, robin, great tit and blue tit: not many species because although I live in a village (plenty of trees) we’re on the edge of a large city (so no open farmland). Still, the blackbirds made sure the chorus was loud and liquid, and the dawn chorus should be as musical for a few more days.

“This poem is not as it was first written but editing has, to my mind, given it a tighter focus. It was originally a sonnet, and covered two ‘choruses’: one, the birdsong (as appears here) and the second the early morning noises as an old house wakes up, with the creaking of hot water pipes and the radio’s news broadcast. Unsure if this worked I put it away for a few months: when it re-appeared I cut the sestet so that all the attention fell on the birdsong.” 

D.A. Prince lives in Leicestershire and London. Her first appearances in print were in the weekly competitions in The Spectator and New Statesman (which ceased its competitions in 2016) along with other outlets that hosted light verse. Something closer to ‘proper’ poetry followed (but running in parallel), with three pamphlets, followed by a full-length collection, Nearly the Happy Hour, from HappenStance Press in 2008. A second collection, Common Ground, (from the same publisher) followed in 2014 and this won the East Midlands Book Award in 2015. HappenStance subsequently published her pamphlet Bookmarks in 2018, with a further full-length collection, The Bigger Picture, published in 2022. New Walk Editions published her latest pamphlet, Continuous Present, in 2025.

Photo: “Dawn Chorus…” by Dave – aka Emptybelly is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.

Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, ‘Qué hermoso es ver el día’, translated by Paul Burgess

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Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (1836-1870)

How beautiful to view the crown
of fire encircling day, to watch its rise,
to see its kiss illuminate
the brilliant waves, its blaze ignite the skies!

How beautiful in gloomy fall
to drink perfume from flower petals still
a little moist from morning rain,
to breathe in sweetness ‘til you’ve had your fill!

How beautiful to watch as white
descends in silent flakes of powdered snow,
to gaze at crimson tongues that stir
within the hearth that frames their crackling glow!

How beautiful when feeling tired
to rest a snoring head on pillows’ fluff,
to eat and drink and fatten up!
And what a shame these things are not enough!

*****

Paul Burgess writes: “Instead of providing a strict, academic translation, I have sought to recreate the experience of reading Bécquer. While recognizing that this is “my” Bécquer, I hope that this version will help contemporary English speakers enjoy the nearly untranslatable musicality and lyricism of one of the finest lyric poets to have ever written in Spanish.”

‘A Translation from Bécquer’ was originally published in Snakeskin.

Rima LXVII: Qué hermoso es ver el día

¡Qué hermoso es ver el día
coronado de fuego levantarse
y a su beso de lumbre
brillar las olas y encenderse el aire!

¡Qué hermoso es, tras la lluvia
del triste otoño en la azulada tarde,
de las húmedas flores
el perfume aspirar hasta saciarse!

¡Qué hermoso es cuando en copos
la blanca nieve silenciosa cae,
de las inquietas llamas
ver las rojizas lenguas agitarse!

¡Qué hermoso es cuando hay sueño
dormir bien… y roncar como un sochantre…
Y comer… y engordar… y qué desgracia
que esto sólo no baste!

Paul Burgess is the sole proprietor of a business in Lexington, Kentucky that offers ESL classes in addition to English, Japanese, and Spanish-language translation and interpretation services. He has contributed work to Blue Unicorn, The Road Not Taken, Light, The Orchards, Snakeskin, Pulsebeat, Lighten Up Online, Apricity, Star*Line, Asses of Parnassus, The New Verse News, and many other publications.

Using form: George Simmers, ‘A Triumphal Ode’

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decorative

A TRIUMPHAL ODE
Humbly Inſcribed to the Occaſion of The moſt Joyous and Auspicious ARRIVAL of
ANDREW MOUNTBATTEN-WINDSOR, Eſq.
at His Majeſty’s PRISON of BRIXTON
Composed with all due Solemnity & Pomp
and designed to be ſet to Muſick by
the late Great GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL

All the echoing prison round
Let great tumultuous welcome sound.
Let each incarcerated fellow
Loud and jubilantly bellow.
Let there be no dereliction;
Convicts, show your true conviction
In strong words and in minatory songs
That he is now where he belongs.

Let there be all kinds of musical cacophonies
Let there be mighty rattling of warders’ keys
Let there be synchronised humming of drug-transporting drones
Let them sound, the unharmonious ringtones of contraband phones
Let noise be noise in our unanimous celebration
Of this long-overdue incarceration.

He comes! Let every crooked eye be fixed on
The arrival of Mr Mountbatten-Windsor at Brixton.
He who for so long has sinned with impunity
Let him now be welcomed into the criminal community.
Here with the weaklings and the wicked,
Here with the druggie and the dickhead,
Here among the child molesters,
The frauds and Just Stop Oil protestors
The terrorists, the traitors
And the far-right agitators,
The ponces and the nonces, plus the mugger and the blagger,
The cracksman with a jemmy and the psycho with a dagger,
All citizens of this prison world, the scum of every slum
Rejoice and raise a happy voice that he at last is come
He, born second in line to the throne, now come to live
In the world where the snout baron rules, and the man with the shiv

Let him, the ex-royal, the ex-envoy for trade
Come here among his kindred, to the future he has made.

*****

George Simmers writes: “The Epstein revelations have muddied the reputations of many eminent men, and nobody looks grubbier than Mr Mountbatten-Windsor. The distasteful stories and compromising photographs have told their story. The only way is down. This Ode looks forward to celebrating an event that the British public is anticipating eagerly.

“It is doubtful whether prosecutions will follow for many of Mr Epstein’s guests. Their morals may be questionable and their reputations have suffered, but illegality can be hard to prove – it was Mr Epstein himself who did all the luring and procuring. But Mr Mountbatten-Windsor, because of his distinguished family connections, was lured not only with massages, but also with financial inducements. At the time when he was an official trade envoy of the British government, he had access to financial information (such as details of a forthcoming budget) that could have been very valuable to an investor like Mr Epstein. Documents in the voluminous Epstein archive suggest that such information was indeed shared. Mr M-W could therefore be prosecuted for the very serious offence of misconduct in a public office. This ode looks forward to the time when this foolish man is made to answer for his misdeeds.

“Such are the delays that have slowed the British court system since the hiatus of the Covid years, that legal experts estimate that Mr Mountbatten-Windsor’s case is unlikely to reach a court until 2030. It’s a long time to wait, but in the final eventuality, I hope that this ceremonial ode will be sung joyously by a massed choir. I imagine it set to music by that eminent composer George Frideric Handel, who was very good at such things. To those who object that Mr Handel is dead, I would point out that there is a psychic in America who has made productive contact with the shade of Mozart. Several peasant concerti have apparently resulted. I’m sure the lady could persuade Mr. Handel’s ghost, too, to come up with the goods. I imagine something a bit like the Hallelujah Chorus, but maybe even more jubilant.”

‘A Triumphal Ode’ was first published in Snakeskin.

George Simmers used to be a teacher; when he retired he then amused himself by researching a Ph.D. on the prose literature of the Great War. He now spends his time pottering about, walking his dog and writing a fair bit of verse. He is currently obsessed by the poetry of Catullus, and has self-published a slim volume of translations. He has edited Snakeskin since 1995. It is probably the oldest-established poetry zine on the Internet. His work appears in several Potcake Chapbooks, and his most recent general collection is ‘Old and Bookish‘. Another may be on the way.

Chris O’Carroll, ‘Dorothy Parker on Andrew Marvell’

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He doesn’t have the time, he pleads,
For long and patient wooing.
A mortal man with urgent needs,
He would be up and doing.

He’d worship for two hundred years
Your left breast, then your right,
He swears, but can’t because he fears
Death’s swift-encroaching night.

He notes how brief are human lives.
He says you mustn’t tease,
For once that chariot arrives,
You’ll have no days to seize.

Though you know joining him in bed
Is what you’ll likely do,
You’re certain romance will be dead
Before the two of you.

*****

Chris O’Carroll writes: “Dorothy Parker’s verse paints her enthusiastic about sex but skeptical about romance. I wanted to incorporate both of those outlooks into her imagined response to Marvell’s famous come-hither argument.”

‘Dorothy Parker on Andrew Marvell’ was first published in Snakeskin.

Chris O’Carroll is the author of four books of poems — The Joke’s on Me, Abracadabratude, Quantum Creed, and the newly published Ridiculous Positions. He is a Light magazine featured poet and a contributor to Love Affairs at the Villa Nelle, Extreme Sonnets, New York City Haiku, and The Great American Wise Ass Poetry Anthology, among other collections.

RHL, ‘Fifty Year Argument: Old Fool, Young Twit’

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1. To Myself in Fifty Years Time

Old fool!  You really think yourself the same
As I who write to you, aged 22?
Ha!  All we’ve got in common is my name:
I’ll wear it out, throw it away,
You’ll pick it up some other day….
        But who are you?

My life’s before me; can you say the same?
I choose its how and why and when and who.
I’ll choose the rules by which we play the game;
I may choose wrong, it’s not denied,
But by my choice you must abide….
        What choice have you?

If, bored, I think one day to see the world
I pack that day and fly out on the next.
My choice to wander, or to sit home-curled;
Each place has friends, good fun, good food,
But you sit toothless, silent, rude….
        And undersexed!

Cares and regrets of loss can go to hell:
You sort them out with Reason’s time-worn tool.
Today’s superb; tomorrow looks as well:
The word “tomorrow” is a thrill,
I’ll make of mine just what I will….
        What’s yours, old fool?

2. Reply to Myself – Fifty Years Later

Young twit! You really think we’re not the same?
That means you’re too young to extrapolate.
You’re the mere seed of what I since became:
    a husband, father, game creator,
    global skills facilitator…
        well paid; thought great!

You claimed to thrive, renting some garbage heap;
you travelled: hitchhiked, froze, thought life’s a bitch,
and ate whatever you could find that’s cheap;
    I travel too, and I eat well,
    and choose to sleep in a hotel…
        not in a ditch!

Your search for happiness was excellent;
you lived with several countries, faiths and girls,
though little lasted from those years you spent;
    for when you can’t tell love from lust
    and never work out who to trust…
        of course life whirls!

Your limited perspective proved a sham.
Your rude invective, though a load of shit,
helped fertilise my growth to what I am.
        My resumé –kids raised, loves gained,
        a business built –shows much attained…
            what’s yours, young twit?

*****

I was proud of the form I created when I wrote the first bratty poem, with both the rhyme scheme (abaccb) and the lines getting shorter (3 pentameter, 2 tetrameter, and a dimeter) contributing to the effect of each stanza ending with a punchline. But after I wrote that first poem to my future self at age 22, I was nagged by the need to respond as I got older; and I was never able to produce anything I liked. Finally, a full 50 years later, I produced the 72-year-old’s point by point rebuttal in the same form as the original. The original took a couple of hours over two days to write; the response was done in a couple of hours in one day.

The argument was first published in Snakeskin.

The illustration is one of Tenniel’s for Lewis Carroll’s “You are old, Father William“. And, yes, I still do headstands.

Sonnet: Saad Kayani, ‘Sonnet’

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I see no pretty things to write about.
Industrial smoke obscures the summer skies.
No novel image schemas to lay out—
no logical entailments to devise.
I’ll write instead of how efficient, say,
a cluster bomb can be, the skill it takes
to mow the grass on which the children play
and monetize the rubble that it makes.
But better artists beat me to that muse:
the medalists whose medals killers win,
the columnists who weave the daily news,
and spin, and spin, and spin, and spin, and spin!
I’m dizzy now—no pretty things to say.
Poetry is for fascists anyway!

*****

‘Sonnet” was first published in Snakeskin.

Saad Kayani lives in Toronto. Recent poems appear in Shot Glass Journal and Neologism Poetry Journal.

Photo: “GAZA Crisis July 2014” by Syeda Amina Trust® is licensed under CC BY 2.0.