This is a beautiful "Barry Hodges" poem.*

Ah, sweet memories of that night in Blarney
In the stout-soaked suburbs of ould Cork City.
How clearly through the mist of alcoholic memory
I recall how we all piled out of Johnny's bar at closing time
****** as a load of proverbial ******* newts;
'Where to now me boys, which bar's still open?'
Shrieked spiflicated Sean O'Shannon
(that's notorious sixteen pints an hour Sean,
the man who won Strictly Come Boozing twice)
As he tottered over to his Pa's new BMW convertible,
Lucky ****** that he is to be son to a Fianna Fáil MEP,
And one not adverse to trousering a Euro or two.

'Sean, me oul' potato, de ye think ye should be driving
With that record-breakin' skinful o' stout
I just seen you put away down your greasy gullet,
Not to mention the quadruple whiskey chaser?'
Enquired loopy Liam O'Lephrechaun as he leaned over
And puked up another gallon of warmish Guinness
Over yours truly as I rolled helplessly in the Ballygrohan road
To the amusement of the gawping bystanders,
Bearing in mind there were a good dozen gobbets
Of half-digested pork scratchings in the froth
Which was causing havoc with my apparel.

So without another feckin' word being spoken
My dear drinking companions and ***** buddies
Left me prostrate and clambered gaily into the waiting car
And roared off into the enchanted Gaelic night;
Singing and smoking themselves silly simultaneously,
So full of the joys of life and the blessed bottle.
And then some ****** stupid American tourist
(doubtless dressed in hideous checked golfing trousers
with a backwards-facing baseball cap on his ugly head,
not to forget his overweight wifey crammed into the front seat
just like a huge white bloated fat-faced hippo),
Came round the next corner in a clapped out rental car
And the two of them got sent to Kingdom-sodding-Come
With a terrible metallic crash which destroyed them completely.

'Oh begorrah and *******, would ye just look at the mess
The feckin eejit's made of me Daddy's Beemer,
And it's his pride and joy so it is to be sure!'
Cried Sean O'Shannon in an alcoholic rage,
As he contemplated the largest insurance claim
In the County Cork for the past six decades,
(at least the largest legitimate one anyway).
Whilst I was trying to get my hipster pants down
To avoid filling them up with beery diarrhoea
Brought on by my involuntary bursts of joyous mirth,
(bejasus, 'twas the second time in the space of a single week
and my new girlfriend was getting a bit fussy about hygiene
bearing in mind she was thinking of taking the veil).

How fortunate old Father Tucker and Garda Sergeant O'Toole
Could both (when they'd sobered up sufficiently)
Testify later from their secure vantage point
In the rear compartment of a nearby parked hearse,
(where they were having a ******* with Deidre,
the filthiest wee **** in the whole South-Western counties)
That the accident was not dear Sean's fault at all, to be sure,
As the other stupid sober yankee ****** was driving at 75
On the wrong friggin' side of the ******' street
Or probably in the middle, come to think of it.
'Sure but Sean's the best driver this side of the Blarney Stone,
And there's no way himself would ever drive under the influence'*
They agreed sagely before going off for another jar or two
And maybe a double knee-trembler with Deidre's fat sister,
One up each of her gaping hair-rimmed orifices.

I love your skin
The feel of it against mine.
Running my eager hands up and down your sides, it's just the right amount of roughness, masculine and sublime.
The color of your skin
The smell of it
The weight of it
Since last we met
I just can't get it out of my head.

Father Time wanted the future.
Mother Earth begged him to stop.
Bleeding, hurting, dying inside,
And Father still turned the clock.

Mother Earth gave us compassion.
Father took it away.
He argued it was too old fashioned,
And that compassion was too mundane.

Father Time gave us sinful, skinful pleasure.
Mother Earth pleaded against so.
She knew it'd make her baby sick.
It'd make time fly out the window.

Mother gave us crystal waters.
Father dried all the lakes.
Father Time, some figure head father
We're to believe he doesn't make mistakes.

Father Time is our god.
So we should all believe in him.
Mother Earth will no longer nod.
She knows our god has sinned.

Mother Earth isn't stable.
Mother's choking last breaths,
Begging for another choice
Father knows she is unable,
He lets  women have no voice.

Cutting her down
For the last
Heartmolding
Time,
That awful man
Cruelly ended
Something so divine,
Mother Earth was mine.
And now?
I cannot find her.

Father spun her purely out of existence.
Father of it all,
Cackling still,
This ******* persistence
Of death
I hear my earth wilt.

tattooing,casting desires deeper than your itch
  my ink spelling words every where you stink
you seem more responsive when they call you *****
  I just want YOU to deliver after YOU think
we will cast lines into the now,living the new
  angling or casting nets in different schools
you whistle one of my tunes,thoughts carry our points of view
  with me battering your shields,you sharpening my tools
I'm casting lots,chancing,I swear you might call me sinful
  knowing no boundaries,spanning bridges,jumping fences
your prize ***** is perfumed wine by the divine skinful
  I do dare to share in your gifts of senses
I dare to cast an eye over your image within your frame
  and hold them both when you are hot and cold
listening to your  songs when you play your name
you will cause me to search for treasures of old
cast down your burdens speak to me in confidence free from fears
  downcast looks have never been emblematic of your worth
I toil with dirt and sweat in exchange for your loving and tears
to buy tonight with you and tomorrow with the earth
broadcast the forecast sell me what you believe
  tell me what you think let me feel what you throw
do you bleed from the heart tattooed on your sleeve
  are you typecast do you ink what you think do you show what you know

We all piled out of the pub
****** as a load of newts;
'Where to now boys?'
Bellowed naughty Niall O 'Neill
(that's notorious nineteen pints a night Niall)
As he tottered over to his Pa's Rolls Royce.

'Do ye think ye should be driving
With that record-breakin' skinful
I just seen you put away?'
Enquired serious Sean slurringly
From his slightly inconvenient
Viewpoint in the beery gutter.

So we all clambered gaily into the car
And roared off into the enchanted night
And then this ****** stupid clodhopper
Who didn't even have his driving licence yet
Came round the next corner in his Ford
And got sent to Kingdom-sodding-Come.

'Oh ****, would ye just look at the mess
The oul' fella's made of me Daddy's car,
And it's his pride and joy so it is!'
Cried Niall O'Neill in incandescent rage,
As he surveyed the largest insurance claim
In the County Wicklow for twenty years.

How fortunate Father Tucker and Garda Sergeant O'Toole
Could both testify from their vantage point
In the front seat of the devastated Roller,
The accident was not Niall's fault at all, at all,
As the other stupid sober ****** was on
The wrong side of the ****** street.

Arm gooin' daàn me muvva's
An arm gonna goo by buz
Cos me feet am bloomin' urtin'
An I aint got me an oss

Then arm off to ave some bevvies
An arm gonna get kaylied
If yow'm in the Jolly Nailor
Then arl shaàt ya one inside

Doh goo bein' a soft apeth
Doh goo doin' owt thats daft
Cos when yow'v dun ad' a skinful
Then yow know yow just get saft

If ar doh see yow befow'r yow goo
Arl see yow on anon
Cos arm kippin' on the sofa
Raànd me mums aàs back up um

The castle was smaller than I’d thought
In the Scottish countryside,
It sat in a hollow called Claymore Court
Where all the defenders died,
The signs of cannon, pounding the towers
Were there in the crumbled walls,
And shrubs grew out of the rubbled bowers
While trees took root in the halls.

I sensed a touch of hostility
The moment I reached the gate,
For Angus’s friendability
Came on just a little late,
We’d both attended the Priory School
But that had been way back then,
And I, in parting, called him a fool,
He wouldn’t remember when.

But he did us proud with a suckling pig
And a quart of ‘**** o’ the North’,
Marie, who knew him, was ever so big
And sat with me, holding forth.
I had no mind that he felt so strong,
I’d have left the woman at home,
He had this feeling I’d done him wrong
When I coaxed Marie to roam.

And there she sat with a month to go
Way out in front with our bairn,
I didn’t know it would crease him so
But there, you live and you learn.
He coaxed her drink, with a dreadful leer
Pressed on her **** o’ the North,
It wasn’t as if she was drinking beer
Or water, for all that it’s worth.

We went to bed in a tower room
When the moon rose over the glen,
It felt to me like a Highland tomb
As it was to my clan back then,
Marie began to moan in the night
That the bairn was coming forth,
It had a skinful, thanks to Marie
Of that liquor, **** o’ the North.

And Angus heard and he came to gloat
When he heard that she couldn’t hold,
I dropped him there, head first in the moat
To a grave both wet and cold.
Marie and I, we sit in the barn
And the blame swings back and forth,
What price my friend, and a helpless bairn
To a jar of **** o’ the North?

David Lewis Paget

In my mind, I'm chained to the bed.
The bed rests on the gallows pole.
The gallows pole adjacent to temples of merciful Gods. Gods nowhere to be seen, heard, or felt.
The senses numb and rust.
The rust dulls the chains, I break free.
I leap faithless off the gallows pole, uncertain of how high it sat on bigots' lap.
I pass by the temples as I dive, no mercy to be found. Idolised figures, sanctified mortals and no sacred Gods.
I'm descending aimlessly.. No ground to be found. Until I feel that skinful ground, until I see the two starry skies and until I hear the heartbeats of mercy, I'm unable to land.