“If you scratch my back,”
said the cuttlefish,
“I'll scratch yours, my dear,
for you're really quite a dish!”
“If we were to wed,
'neath overhead night starry,
upon the ocean bed,”
replied the calamari,
“just think,
when the ink
has dried,
together
we'll be tied,
I'll be your Belle,
you'll be my Beau,
and happily we'll be,
ever after... squid pro quo.”
It looked like a bleached tongue
pulled from a mouth,
petrified and incapable
now of letting a word slide over
its calcified silence.
I picked it out of the wet sand
and held it in my hand.
It had little weight, smooth
on one side and pitted
on the other. A cuttlefish bone.
It was a marvel of engineering.
My fingers followed its shape,
took in its texture, the pleasurable
feel of its form. I lifted it to my nose
and smelt its salty, faintly fishy
odor, sea washed to a clean
unsullied smell. It had undergone
a change into something
beyond life, into an artifact of time.
I kept it cradled in my hands,
held it like a sacred relic.
I have seen them too
shrink wrapped in plastic bags
on the end of supermarket shelves,
a calcium supplement for birds
to be hung on a hook
inside of a cage.
They were selling for $2.50
or thereabouts.
The tide and heavy seas
had washed up a wealth
of treasures to lay at my feet
spread out in a long line
just like the way wares
are displayed on the street
of an outdoor market.
Shells, some polished
to a sheen others just broken
shards of a puzzle never
to be put back together again.
Tresses of weed, float bladders,
a cuttlefish bone and globs
of jellyfish shaped like petrified
tears as if once welled
out of the eyes of a whale.
Then there was a hoard
of man made stuff, plastic cups
and brightly coloured beads
of who knows what, spoons
and bottle tops, matted balls
of red and green twine
and fishing line knitted into
swatches of transparent twill,
a smorgasbord of human
endeavor all laid out in wonder
and ready to kill.
"I am feeling it." He said.
He meant his age. As I watched
I saw a vision…
Out from the cuttlefish bones of his breast
grime coughed up and dribbled.
I saw his heart stutter, the vapid flutter,
watched his lungs belch and utter
like a broken bladder.
A horseman on a creaking steed
raised its hoary head
and pointed an ancient ladle
speaking thus -
"Stir me belly lad," it said,
"spoon me sticky sump,
dole globs of lymph from here to there.
Me grease is dumpy and lumpy.
Me hip-bones crunch
while me dingle wilts and dangles.
Me ears is gummy lad,
I've gone to the bad.”
The specter faded.
The old guy smiles, rubs his thin hair.
"I also see it sometimes," he says,
"that liver-spotted ghost
that chains me to an even older vision
of you."
my fluffy puppy with curly hair
wags the tail on his derriere
he jumps on my lap in a slapstick scene
licking my face ‘till squeaky clean
his gitty kitty butter ball brother
is a spotted sibling by another mother
that chases red lights up the wall
like a short legged fella ten feet tall
Pete the parakeet perched undisturbed
sits cracking seeds from a sealed reserve
a cuttlefish bone hangs in his home
to sharpen his beak with precision hone
B1353
“I am feeling it.” He said.
He meant his age, and as I watched
I saw a vision of him…
Ribs broke away
from the cuttlefish bone of his breast
opening outward in a rueful grin.
I saw his heart stuttering over a word.
I watched his lungs tussling
with a bladder of vapor.
I saw a horseman on a creaking steed
raise its hoary head
and point an ancient ladle
at a long-winded windmill.
“Stir my belly lad,” it said.
“spoon out my sump,
dole globs of lymph from here to there.
My oil is vapid, my hip-bones hang
like tree tusks over a wilting groin.
Each ear is a pot
for mulch and millipedes”.
The specter fades.
He smiles, rubs his thin hair.
“I also see it sometimes’” he says,
“this liver-spotted ghost
that chains me
to you.”
A cuttlefish swallowed my house the other day.
He ejected his inky black fluid and we could not get away.
The local newspaper came out and had a heyday.
Interviewing and photographing the monster that you may all say…
Was doing what comes natural in a regular cuttlefish way.
Rather bleak ending to a regular Wednesday.
Frogs’ legs
French cuisine fad
Amphibians hopping mad
Shish kebabs
Cubed lamb chislic
Served on toothpick
Pizzas
Flatbread Italian feast
Waist measurement increased
Bird’s nest soup
Rare Chinese foodstuff
Swiftlets sleeping rough
Mexican wraps
Spicy chicken fajitas
Hot as senoritas
Seafood paella
Shrimp, lobster, cuttlefish
Saporous Valencian dish
Maple syrup
Canadians tree tap
Sticky sweet sap
Digestif
After dinner drink
Brandy glasses clink
17/09/18
'six-word couplet poetry contest' : Sponsored by: Mark Toney
Synchronised zephyrs are holidaying in giant zones. It is interesting to note that this experience is not an easy excursion. For such weight is waving and waving is not a noted duty for any passing shoal of cuttlefish appearing on a highway. To watch a duck eating a four course dinner and drinks is often an enlightening experience. But exploding beach balls can make quite a large amount of mess. Measure messages metrically. And so the talking tiger traverses a roped bridge bringing the lively little cakes. A centimetre chats to a kilometer. And static sailors are looking at the peas. Take no silvery signal box to a five star hotel. Ok then. Wear a silky suit then. Good. That should please a pantry pickle. Hahaha waving washing machine passing. Xxxx Broomfield brook xxxx dodecahedron zzzz
If we have to see the fishes closer
and immerse ourselves under the surface of things
I put on the wetsuit
The diver's paraphernalia
And I let myself go to obscure distances
And think no more at the air, which usually
fill my lungs …
I am a ludion suspended in waters
Tickled by shoals of fish that roam
Caressed by jellyfishes, eager for a country ,
One above, which they are not allowed
As I am no longer allowed for sunlight
So low, beneath tons of moving liquid.
That is, across the border turbulent waves,
A reserved area, where the feeling of feet wouldn’t be enough
And that includes me, and swallows me
Like all the certainties of dry floor …
And cuttlefish lend me their naval ink
Writing for the memory of the abyss,
The silent vrombissemnt of orcas passing
The strange lanterns of monkfishes
And the maze of colorful corals and anemones
Dancing with the warm currents
Barely the memory of man
And an oblique wreck, portholes with crimped
Shells and rust, with its scale
Hanging on the railing of useless.
Pictorial evidence of a moon beam dancing dangerously across a road with a stripped sun is only to be depicted by a jury who knows the sanity of true speech. Whereas a gutless cuttlefish could curd if left in the heat. For over three millenia a greedy goblin has baked human cakes but used land ovens. Land ovens are often incredibly hard to clean really. So grab a sponge early. Before it escapes on that plate. How odd the oddities correlated in an oval office original order of occupation. And a fathomable bag of whiskey and chips are best served in a large bath that dangles from a ceiling akin to a giant swing. Wee wee wee goes the small beetle. Giggling grabbing garters gathering goo. And a paste of pie. Never let it be said that an ornate dish can give orders to a kilo bag of organic potatoes. Ok then. Good. Eighty six miles with a whisk. Must be such a hurtling errand really. Wow. Fantastic isn't it. O overplayed lava of volcanic news in a lava launch. Hahaha tidal travelling trains..hahaha sitting shoes shaping sacks. Xxxxx cosmography z. With the p u q at the Z moment.
Pictorial evidence of a moon beam dancing dangerously across a road with a stripped sun is only to be depicted by a jury who knows the sanity of true speech. Whereas a gutless cuttlefish could curd if left in the heat. For over three millenia a greedy goblin has baked human cakes but used land ovens. Land ovens are often incredibly hard to clean really. So grab a sponge early. Before it escapes on that plate. How odd the oddities correlated in an oval office original order of occupation. And a fathomable bag of whiskey and chips are best served in a large bath that dangles from a ceiling akin to a giant swing. Wee wee wee goes the small beetle. Giggling grabbing garters gathering goo. And a paste of pie. Never let it be said that an ornate dish can give orders to a kilo bag of organic potatoes. Ok then. Good. Eighty six miles with a whisk. Must be such a hurtling errand really. Wow. Fantastic isn't it. O overplayed lava of volcanic news in a lava launch. Hahaha tidal travelling trains..hahaha sitting shoes shaping sacks. Xxxxx cosmography z. With the p u q at the Z moment.
A semi shriek of an atom bite should never be viewed as the submission of a rug. For rugs wear earplugs, and belts with chains. Very heavy locks can also be located in that type of wirey loops. Fabrics can change and alter through time correction. Using battling beans and chips to dip and slurp can simply not be the answer. It is too generalistic you see. And sweeping crumbs can often uncover missing gems that sparkle. Lewd is the miscommunication and misjudgement of the shrapnel falling from miscellaneous guns. And weary not. And wear not. And weave not. A giant battling bee bomb. Buzz buzz buzz. Extract fuzz. Great. Or not so great. It is deemed less necessary to eat a bacon slice that is not fully cooked. For too much slob is no good for the handle on a door. Gated guarded grating girths. And a fortification of a fibre. Giant slopes where pods are arranged. Oh how wonderful. Wow. And a fornicating hedgerow is neither a fish fork nor a ladle when painted in oils. Italics itemised innermost inherited inhabitants. And of course the passing of nineteen cuttlefish in a sky burst is a scented form of communication through lines of fins. Good. Harmonisation z
The best ingredients found coming from near and far,
can be found at any great Japanese sushi bar.
Along with the seaweed and sake vinegar rice
are many raw seafood items that show to be nice.
There is shrimp, lobster, octopus, squid, and cuttlefish;
salmon, tuna, mackerel, caviar from lumpfish.
Artisans can prepare it in any way you wish.
It goes well by itself, or with crisp fried tempura.
One need not go to Tokyo or Yokohama.
There are many fine places to be found in the States.
On any night, take the car and zoom down with your mates
to any number of great Japanese restaurants.
They have what it takes to satisfy all of your wants.
There are so many fine items anyone can choose
This can be a great night out! You have nothing to lose!
It was a domestic pain,
when we came apart in boots and helmets.
Taking the shine away, moon gave up the fight
on lake, against the clouds, a sniper
intuitingly, started a homicidal blasting
to start the rains.
An ode to sepia needs scrutiny;
cuttlefish had a second thought. No faith
permits the slaughter of septa. Walls were squinting
to see better. A square root will find the squall,
between the breaths. Beyond arousal of oceans
a shaken, surreal, blast from a craven rifle.
Satish Verma
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