© 2021 The Estate of Hassel Smith
All Rights Reserved.
Untitled
Imbedded in a sky of lead
a giant's mumble
a giant's treat
a giant's angry grumble;
Clashes!
As night descends
the sky lit up by angry flashes
...upends
War Games. GAMES?
Rehearsals for
another war
Noisy choppers, low flying jets
Outrageously increase the nation's debts
Battle stations feed no starving third world.
HWS
Invocation at Midnight
Twelve o'clock!
Clock! Note carefully the hour!
The Devil's horsed upon us now.
Ride Red, ride!
Trumpets!
Sound the chase! Speak!
Speak, mouths of brass, bay us the moon,
Earth's dark satellite.
Clarinet!
You of the slender throat there, play!
Play Pipes of Pan!
Saxes, drums, guitars, all of you, all, all together now
For us to dance.
Dance? Dance?
You've got ants in your pants, boy!
Here, you! Charlie! for chrissakes! Another drink before we die!
HWS 1943
Untitled
The affluent effluent 400 stand or stood
for neither evil of for good
but having reached a certain state of grace
infest the place
command its heights
overlook its most attractive sights.
The working class for them is trash
to be bought & sold for cash
but never more than can be spared
lest wealthy pleasures be impaired.
With what repulsive greed
they buy the many things they do not need
oil and diamonds, furs and spice
these lice
their baleful faces
turning up in all
the world's most sheltered places.
HWS
Untitled
Skin-tight jeans & satin evening gowns reveal
precisely what we wish they would conceal;
BLATANT BUTTOCKS! BORING BUMS!
the-all-too-human ass behind, while at the fore
protuberances that we abhor.
PUBLIC PILLOWS! PELVIC LUMPS!
padded out we may suspect
for provocative effect.
& what about those mammary mounds
that Maidenform pretends to keep in bounds,
the ghastly fissure
we are forced to contemplate at leisure,
the nipples node
obscenely peeping out from modesty's abode.
OH! for the days of Quakerish restraint
eye-shadow OUT, no garish paint
whalebone, worsted & blue serge
defied the bestial urge.
HWS c.1980
Untitled
Well within the time allowed
anger altered, mater plowed
All the honey-covered pills are taken
trees that bear no fruit are shaken
BLAST THE BOOBIES, bill the brats
moss-grown monkeys, mildewed cats
Must we murder mater's mummy?
tie her tubes and slit her tummy?
Vend the vulva, flog the Volvo
you won't be paid to kill the Dodo.
HWS 1984
Life & Death on a Devonshire Pond
Where insects breed
Wagtails walk on floating rafts of weed
and feed
Mindful of the inlets nutrient flow
trout patrol the depths below
rise to gobble flies unwary
themselves to be the wachtful heron's quarry.
HWS 1986
To Tom Ingram Who Loves These Fields so Much
Beneath a cloudless sky
an hundred acre field defies the eye;
so yellow that it seems it must contain
some laboratorial stain, some man-made dye.
Cadmium? Chrome? No bovine piss
produces colour such as this!
"Mad" Vincent would indeed go mad
to sort out from his box a tube
from which such a pigment would exude.
Mustard? Rape?
Amid its saffron blooms a myriad tiny beetles toil.
The farmer meanwhile thinks of plasters, sandwhich spread
and oil
HWS 1992
Alphabetical Doggerel
A is for aardvark
B is for bump
C is for cock-up
D is for dump
E is for effluent
F is for frump
G is for gastric
H is for hump
I is for inmate
J is for jump
K is for knockneed
L is for lumps
N is for nackered
M is for mumps
O is for offal
P is for plump
Q is for quagmire
R is for rump
S is for sordid
T is for thump
U is for upchuck
VD
WC
XYZ
HWS 1999
Untitled
As we descend into the darkness
I can still see you.
In the last sunbeam, a fragment of broken glass
I am leading or are you?
Fax me a kiss.
HWS