The Perfume -- A D Hope

Guest poem sent in by "William Grey"

(Poem #1748) The Perfume "... marked males of the silkworm moth have been known to fly upwind seven miles to a fragrant female of their kind ... the chemical compound with which a female silkworm moth attracts mates is highly specific; no other species seem aware of it. In 1959, the Nobel Laureate Adolph Butenandt of the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Munich succeeded in analysing it. He found it to be an alcohol with sixteen carbon atoms per molecule ...." L. and M. Milne: The Senses of Animals and Men. 0 Chloë, have you heard it, This news I sing to you? It's true, my lovely bird, it Is absolutely true! A biochemist probing Has caught without a doubt The Queen of Love disrobing And found her secret out. What drives the Bombyx mori To fly, intrepid male, Lured by the old, old story Six miles against the gale? The formula, my Honey, Is now in print to prove What is, and no baloney, The very stuff of love. At Munich on the Isar Those molecules were found Which everyone agrees are What makes the world go round; What draws the male creation To love, my darling doll, Turns out, on trituration, To be an alcohol. A Nobel Laureatus Called Adolph Butenandt Contrived to isolate us This strong intoxicant. The boys are celebrating And singing at the club: Here's Bottoms up! to mating, Since Venus keeps a pub! My angel, 0, my angel, What is it you suffuse, What redolent evangel, What nosegay of good news? What draws me like a dragnet And holds and keeps me tight? What odds! my fragrant magnet, I shall be drunk tonight! -- A D Hope

The thread of poems on intoxication prompts me to submit a poem  by
Australian poet A.D. Hope (1907-2000) linking intoxication and love. It is
the second in a sextet entitled 'Six Songs for Chloë'. Hope had a thirst
for learning which ranged widely over texts ancient and modern, and which
included contemporary research in science as well as poetry and philosophy.

The poem is from A.D. Hope, New Poems 1965-69, pp. 33-34.

William Grey

Grass -- Carl Sandburg

Guest poem submitted by Philip Schreiner:

(Poem #1747) Grass Pile the bodies high at Austerlitz and Waterloo. Shovel them under and let me work -- I am the grass; I cover all. And pile them high at Gettysburg And pile them high at Ypres and Verdun. Shovel them under and let me work. Two years, ten years, and passengers ask the conductor: What place is this? Where are we now? I am the grass. Let me work. -- Carl Sandburg

This poem really impressed me when I was young.  One of the few poems I ever
felt compelled to take to memory.  I noticed that you have a good number of
Sandburg poems (relatively speaking) on your website, so maybe this one does
not appeal to everybody [1].

Philip Schreiner.

[1] Or maybe we just never got round to running it :) -- thomas.

The Deluge -- G K Chesterton

Fascinating how a poem about tea kicked off so bibulous a theme!
Speaks volumes about the Minstrels readership, I guess :) Anyway, here's the
next in the series, a guest poem sent in by Flavia :

(Poem #1746) The Deluge Though giant rains put out the sun, Here stand I for a sign. Though earth be filled with waters dark, My cup is filled with wine. Tell to the trembling priests that here Under the deluge rod, One nameless, tattered, broken man Stood up, and drank to God. Sun has been where the rain is now, Bees in the heat to hum, Haply a humming maiden came, Now let the deluge come: Brown of aureole, green of garb, Straight as a golden rod, Drink to the throne of thunder now! Drink to the wrath of God. High in the wreck I held the cup, I clutched my rusty sword, I cocked my tattered feather To the glory of the Lord. Not undone were the heaven and earth, This hollow world thrown up, Before one man had stood up straight, And drained it like a cup. -- G K Chesterton

There must be thousands and thousands of drinking songs, or songs that have
been used as such (like the Song of Songs, for instance.  Bawdy!), but no
list is *ever* complete without one by Chesterton.  You already have
archived 'the Rolling English Road', but there is also the snarky 'the
Logical Vegetarian'and 'The Song of Right and Wrong' and of course the
delightful 'Wine and Water', which like this is about the Deluge.

Most of them are from the whimsical book 'the Flying Inn', about a dastardly
plan to wipe out every public house in Great Britain(!), and how it was
foiled by a barkeep, a refined poet and a mad Irishman. And the cheese and
the barrel of rum, of course. Yay! Dulce ist decipere in loco!

Flavia

[Links]

Wikipedia page:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton

Several Chesterton works online:
  [broken link] http://www.dur.ac.uk/martin.ward/gkc/books/

The Aerial -- Wendy Cope

Guest poem submitted by Kamalika Chowdhury :

(Poem #1745) The Aerial The aerial on this radio broke A long, long time ago, When you were just a name to me - Someone I didn't know. The man before the man before Had not yet set his cap The day a clumsy gesture caused That slender rod to snap. Love came along. Love came along. Then you. And now it's ended. Tomorrow I shall tidy up And get the radio mended. -- Wendy Cope

Strange that amidst all the hilarity of Cope's verse, little poems like this
get left behind. I have not much to say that the poem doesn't say for
itself, except to express my admiration. Its emotions are everyday-quiet and
deep, modern and somehow feminine, resigned and strong, sad and funny. It
takes life in its stride.

Kamalika.

Untitled -- Dorothy Parker

Guest poem sent in by "Sandeep Bhadra"

(Poem #1744) Untitled I wish I could drink like a lady I can take one or two at the most Three and I'm under the table Four and I'm under the host -- Dorothy Parker

If we were going to have a theme about drinks in general, this one certainly
deserves mention. This poem is typical of Dorothy Parker's aesthetic --
crisp lines, to be meant for the dead-pan delivery of the truly blasé with
very little room for emotion or the pretence thereof. She makes no apology
for the love of her drink or for the consequences of binging on it. She
merely states the outcomes with the cold preciseness of a scientist, or, at
the very least, of an urban realist.

Decadent, self-aware and witty, Dorothy Parker's elite Manhattan social
circle included playwright George Kaufman and New Yorker founder Harold
Ross. They held many of their meetings at the Algonquin Hotel in New York,
which now offers a $10,000 martini, presumably in her honor. The Algonquin
also has this ode on all their napkins, in fond memory of their
distinguished patron.

Sandeep

[Martin adds]

Wikiquotes at least lists this as "attributed" to Dorothy Parker - does
anyone know for sure? It definitely sounds like authentic Parker to me.

martin