Sunday
May242009
Lollipop by Brian Edwards
Brian Edwards May 24, 2009 at 6:46PM
Lollipop
No amount of mini-skirt,
push-up bra or chip-fat lip-gloss
can hide the child inside
the make-up and pig-tail pose.
So, excuse me sir
but what are those legs doing
wrapped around the back
of your fantasy?
They should be gangly
on a dodge-ball court
or dangling from a shopping cart, but
before stamping a well-heeled Western boot
all over The Orient, all aboard HMS Hypocrite
for a trip around the Horn of Wake-Up—
where language is more evolved than Man,
civilised is a millimetre on Time's ruler
and one man's paedophile is another's King.
Reader Comments (15)
obviously dodge-ball was not her strong suit.
Obviously.
can't blame her.
No, I won't.
I didn't follow all of the final verse here but it was a constructive confusion because of the strength of the individual conceits and there was a kind of emotional unity to it, if that makes sense.
The penultimate verse struck me as maybe over-polemical/ didactic. I think that sometimes you tend to underscore the "message" and spell things out which are already implied, which dilutes rather than strengthens the impact. But the quality of the writing overall is excellent and I reread it for enjoyment several times.
but before stamping a well-heeled Western boot all over The Orient, all aboard HMS Hypocrite for a trip around the Horn of Wake-Up—where language is more evolved than Man, civilised is a millimetre on Time's ruler and one man's paedophile is another's King.
Very powerful start, the legs are startling...I'm bothered by the sentence above, beginning "but before" it doesn't seem to resolve what you want the very dodgy reader to do before he traipses off to Thailand with Jonathan King...think it could do with unravelling!
Not often I catch you with punctuation (smiley face maybe winking)
B - very strong and cautionary tale here. Think I've always been counter-cyclical in liking the way you unashamedly write tales in many of your poems, beautifully vivid, lurid almost, with Miro-esque detail.
Wonder if you've pushed to far on "horn of wake-up" when you could have had "horn of plenty"... immediate and very apt in the context...
I'm with John that you sometimes underscore the "moral" of your poems when you've painted it in a thousand shades already. Would you consider dropped paedophile for something more whimsical like "child's play" ?
k
kevin jackson why are you trying to ablate this poet's beloved pedo? child's play is a series of unremarkable horror films.
Thanks for all the input.
Sue, I think your reading of the Western Boot line conflicts with mine, hence the problem, maybe, I think. What do you mean by punctuation?
Kevin, I agree with Matt here. Child's play not only throws up images of Chucky, but changes the tone quite a bit,. Also, to me it is somehow much more sinister to use a pun rather than the P word. Appreciate your thoughts.
B.
Sorry Brian wasn't crystal clear there I meant
Where you begin...but before (stamping...all over The Orient) I think it needs another clause related to it (climb?...aboard...)
Punctuation...can't see what I was drivelling on about, unless I meant line breaks...in which case I should have said so. Sorry!
Thanks for coming back Sue.
Reading this again today, I am not happy with the penultimate stanza, for reasons similar to those pointed out by John and Kevin.
Considering the following revision:
No amount of mini-skirt,
push-up bra or chip-fat lip-gloss
can hide the child inside
the make-up and pig-tail pose.
So, excuse me sir
but what are those legs doing
wrapped around the back
of your fantasy?
I imagine them gangly
on a dodge-ball court
or dangling from a shopping cart,
but then again
language is more evolved than Man,
civilised is a millimetre on Time's ruler
and one man's paedophile is another's King.
Or some such suchness . . . .
Input welcome.
B.
Hi Brian, I prefer the new edit.
Lollipop...good title. evokes those kojak lollies often used as props by st trinian's types.
Stanza one
extends that image, last line shocks as it's revealed that this is not a woman pretending to be a schoolgirl, but a girl being exploited.
The chipfat lipgloss is particularly powerful
Not sure about the push up bra, would she seem younger, more vulnerable without it? (I don't like where I'm walking here!)
Stanza two is the heart of the poem. Brill
stanza three (of the new edit!)
What's I imagine doing there? brings the narrator in to the poem, Maybe some complicity...after all he/she's looking at the image albeit "over the shoulder" of the protagonist. Why not "they should" instead of "I imagine" although I also thought of
did you tempt them gangly
from a dodge ball court
that could be improved...but you get what I mean.
Dangling from a shopping cart brings the age of the child down unmistakably.
Stanza four
Not sure what is going on here
is the narrator saying man's hardly civilised so no wonder children get treated this way? and the last line is ambiguous, almost condoning and the King link is a problem.
Difficult uncomfortable subject of course, I don't know where I'd like the poem to take the reader...Lock 'em all up? try and understand 'em? cure 'em? Ask these questions of the reader? Get Jeanette Krankie to pose for images so no crimes are committed!
Hope that helps, doubt it will!
S
I like it
I was also disappointed with the change to "I imagine them".
Suggest
Why aren't they
gangly on a dodgeball court
Also agree with Sue that the shopping cart image really brings the child's age down. The way carts are in Canada, no kid over maybe the age of two, three at the outside, can fit in one in order to dangle legs. If you mean to bring the age that low, you did it without a doubt, and it certainly does make me think about how young some of the kids are who are preyed upon. If it's there for the gangly/dangling, could the legs dangle from something else, which an older child (who might have something to put in a push up bra) would be on/in? Merry-go-round? Ferris wheel? Batters' bench? Bicycle handle bars?
Still thinking on the last S.
I quite like it, overall. And I really appreciate being able to see the original, and make sense of the comments, and see a revision, too!
I enjoyed from the original, the context of the Western boot stamping the Orient. With that detail, I filled in a riot of imagery.
I have the urge to capitalise the P-word.