A poem for your enjoyment

I am a life long student of poetry and a practitioner on occasion.
I read and appreciate all kinds of work. Charles Bukowski, Ted Hughes, Theodore Roethke, Thom Gunn, Gary Snyder, William Wordsworth, George Gordon (Lord Byron), and just so many more. This piece doesn't bother me, it's well written and highly contrived. That's OK.
The poem does remind me of a classic English folk song, John Barleycorn Must Die, most famously done by Traffic with Steve Winwood on ethereal vocals. It is the nut brown bowl reference that keeps popping up.

 

Mr. Arnold, I've served with poets. I know poets. Poets are friends of mine. Mr. Arnold, you're no poet.

 

Ah, Lloyd Bentsen to Dan Quayle. The greatest put down I've ever seen! I wish Hillary Clinton had told Trump to get the hell away from behind her in that debate. She surely would have won. He was really creepy.

 

I once had a can from Nantucket....

Nevermind. You guys are all critics.

 

That was part of a dozen in a bucket.

 

When last one was gone
Still my thirst carried on.
I saw one of yours, and I snuck it.

 

without analyzing too deeply...the structure is supposed to mimic the lacing in a glass.

related to these lines:
So, if I gulp my sorrows down,
Or see them drown
In foamy draughts of old nut-brown,
Then do I wear the crown,
Without the cross!

the crown he wears is him tipping back his head to chug the beer and the glass is the like a crown.

 

While I am not an emcee, I have been writing poetry as an amateur for fifty years, so take my criticisms for what they're worth.

The rhymes were forced by making unnatural groupings of words, and the words themselves seem poorly chosen, such as in this sentence, in which graceful describes the smoke and free describes the cigar. It is incongruous.

"The graceful smoke-wreaths of this free cigar! "

Really? No word(s) came to this guy to complete the image so well started with the word graceful? The whole poem suffers this same malady.

It strikes me as something written quickly, and likely while a bit drunk, and not given a suitable look over and re-write before declaring it completed.

 

Here’s a poem my 3 year old came up with yesterday:

Untitled
(note: I asked him if it had a name and he said, “no”, so the title might actually be ‘No’)

Dad’s makin’ beer
We’re drinkin’ beer
Take ‘em all
Five-forty

Of note: “Take ‘em all” is a clear reference to one of his favorite songs; “Five-forty” is just a number he likes for some reason.

Way better than the other one...

Suck it, George Arnold!

 

I drank my first beer with my grandfather
he comes to me in dreams....
like the cowboy he was
he tells me about things that used to be
and how to remember all of the quiet things
I tell his story everyday

 

The summer heat warms
bubbles in my glass arise
Oktoberfest now?

Written while enjoying a marzen in August....

 

A wordsmith I'm not
I'll lift a glass, not a pen
An Alesmith will do

 

Since he's dead all criticism, and praise too, is unnecessary

 

I sit at work, going berserk.
Reading of beer, yet I'm stuck here.
Oh to sit in my chair, watching the game
Drinking a beer while my lions play lame.
My only intentions on football sunday
Drinking ale, eating food and wasting away.

As you can tell, I'm ready for the season to start.

 

Right back atcha. Cheers to you, sir!