Shakespeare’s Dog


in the theater tonight, the notion of a poem-potion
courtesy of Shakespeare's dog came unbidden

So when home arrived, was unsurprised that this
very peculiar pug was farting before my own front door.

get lost, I announced got what I need from your boss,
but before I could kick him across the floor,
the pug spake thusly:

this dog knows the boot too well,
it is parcel of this dog's life of no quality,
but if you give me shelter tonite, I will provide,
share some of Speare's un-Published Works
and you can claim it as your own!


kicked that dog across the room,
(having pity earlier I let him in and enter)
told Jim, (that’s what I called him)
he can stay the night, or long as the sun rises up
and goes down unbidden, but, if I ever
caught him plagiarizing, selling sonnets on the side,
I would report him to the ASPCA and the Poet’s Union.

The American Society for the Poets of Conscience Alive -
might have his low hanging ***** cut off in retribution.

he laughed out loud, rhyming funny, pontificating:

well mate,
thanks for the soliloquy,
me ***** long time gone,
but what I know and what I’ve seen
if tale-told you, and you were to listen,
you would keep me around as fodder
for your artistic soul.

in return chappie,
you need only provide me a rug, a fire,
A/C for the languid summer eves,
fodder for me body, and your boots,
far removed from my hindquarters.

We spoke much thereafter,
turns out he served his poet-masters
in many ways, more than a mere footstool.

his snoring keeps me awake some twenty years later.
his love for country music makes me put him on nice days,
outdoors, his headphones securely strapped round his double chins.

ugh that pug. became my best becoming love, old friend,
one of us will pass someday and an elegy composition,
the other devotee will furnish sadness utterly becoming.

so if a farting pug before your door you’ve  found,
take him in, give him water, an amply supply please
of Carrie, Trisha and Chaplin-Carpenter for his immortal soul,
but beware, he might try to sell you
some of my words, as your own.

Every year now:
First it’s those trumpeting Daffodils,
Bluebells and Crocuses.
Forsythia Time too.
All manner of colourful blossoms
On trees and shrubs.
Cherry Blossoms abound.

Then a succession of buds
And flowerings.
In my garden alone
We have tall
Some leaning
Pye Plants (as I call them):
Rustic red, pink and white.
Beds of Geraniums,
Some Purple or Blue
Or wide-spreading pink.

My lawn
Decorated with daisies
And buttercups
And unknown bright orange flowers
So orange…
And not forgetting
Those bright yellow Dandelions:
Officially weeds (like Pye Plants)
Yet full of sun.

I take pictures of these each year
But the come out the same
Just about.
More wild Lavateras this time
Maybe
With fewer ferns
(White flowered).
But my trusty roses
Keep coming up with
The goods.
Petal curled within petal.

My beautiful Weigela
Or maybe Abelia
Stands proud
In my back garden
Beneath the Cotoneasters.
A kaleidoscope of blossoming flowers
All attended by swarms
Of humming bees –
An orchestral murmur
Punctuated often
By squabbling sparrow twitterings
And blackbird badgerings.
Sacred gardens
To slumber down in.

Paul Butters

© PB 6\6\2020.

when the ghost of the dark cried for sunset
and the darkness arrived like a storm
the cliffs all angular and windswept
to wait long for the blossoms of dawn,

the dark all a seascape of blackness
a dance that soon opened every door
the clouds darkest grey, hardly
senseless,
the waves that blue anchored
the shore.

our love was a drifting of sorrow
like a tide only longing to flow
baptised while it waits for the morrow,
the moon’s tender orb all aglow,

when i kiss you beneath the
bright starlight
each star throws a fisherman’s
net,
and your flesh tastes like silvery
moonlight,
like the first night we met.

the late clouds gather their silver
the wind blows like the song of a ghost,
and my heart pounds like a
burgeoning river,
and all time in its fever is lost.

the storm’s edge blows open the
window,
the shutters pushed out from the sill
the clouds are a story of sorrow,
the evening all chill,

the night hangs her clothes in
her wardrobe
the sun sleeps like a cloudy
old bear
and all of my love like a snow
globe
white petaled, moon-scented and fair.

i dream of you like a silvery ocean
whose tide ever beats ever back
your love all a hypnotic potion
painted silver and black.

Times are getting, harder and harder.
Times are getting , darker and darker.
Times are getting, scarily and scarily.
Times are getting, sadder and sadder.
Times are getting , lonelier and lonelier.
Times are getting, more depressing here.
God is allowing this to draw us to him.
For only he can save us from all of this.
He wants to deliver us and then save us.

Here the pines blush
in the cloud's embrace
the sky comes low
falls for earth's face

the winds kiss
long lines of wood
fog weaves dense
peace of solitude

Here the curves
meanders blind
on magical turns
stumbles mind

all inner demons
the high lands slay
on angel's wings
you fall love's prey.