Paul Tristram- Three Poems

Two Drunks, One Barstool

One clambering up
as the other’s falling down.
A riot of Oxfam tweed
and nicotine-stained fingers.
As The Beatles, loudly
helter-skelter it
from the pub jukebox wall.
These inebriated,
part cwtching, part jousting
wobbling Knights
tilt and manoeuvre
into shapes and sizes
almost beyond description
and sensible reason?
It would seem
that a second or two,
perched unsteadily
yet, defiantly, on top
whilst t’other
uses bottom
for a backrest.
Is well worth
the carpets burns,
bumps, bruises
and a possible
86’d conclusion.

© Paul Tristram 2015

Broken Beer Bottle

You could almost hear the ‘Death March’
succeeding the delicate, intricate melody
of cracking, splintering, smashing glass.
We all turned to watch the liquid contents
glug mournfully away like spilt blood,
now unemployable, useless and ridiculous.
He was totally and utterly inconsolable!
It was the final coffin nailed baseball bat
to break the stubborn camel’s back.
He crawled behind the back of the settee
and stayed there chanting like a madman
until the next quarter day beer-run returned.
When we tempted him out from hiding
like a Coypu from a burrowed river bank
by opening a plastic cider flagon and leaving
it sizzling gorgeously outside of the entrance.

© Paul Tristram 2014

In-Fighting? Outside Motherfucker!

We were on this Traveller’s Site,
I pushed him off, roughly
and he slid down into the mud.
This always happens
when he drinks port and cider.
I haven’t seen him
for a couple of years,
an hour and a half ago
he’d had his arms around me
with his happy weeping head
upon my shoulder, slurring
that he loved me like a brother.
Now, he’s on the deck
kicking his fighting legs around
like an epileptic frog
with his combat trousers
halfway down to his knees
growling “Outside Motherfucker!”
As I bend down to help him up,
I’m shaking my head with laughter,
advising him to look up at the sky,
we’re already outside and dancing,
the stupid, drunken, lovable idiot.

© Paul Tristram 2015


Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories, sketches and photography published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.
 
Buy his book ‘Poetry From The Nearest Barstool’ at http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1326241036
And also read his poems and stories here! http://paultristram.blogspot.co.uk/