Rats

[Brownlie]

I tried here but I don't think it came out very good.


Whenever I would wake at night
I heard them in the walls
I sought a corpse to pin them to
To lift this ghastly pall

The peanut butter traps I set
To kill them never sprung
My couching scent disguised by gloves
Didn’t hide the reek of rum

In the garage I got my corpse
A rodent cased in heat
I took a shovel scooping it
Into a dusty sheet

I held the figure of a ghost
That bled upon a cloth
And felt the warmness draped in pale
And saw a fleeing moth

Secluded here the nestled bug
Had filled the garb with holes
I wrapped the sleeping body tight
In bedding with a roll

[ChristopherSea]

Brownlie, you got an eek out of me. I hate mieces-to-pieces and rats too. I thought the poem may have stalled on 'My couching scent...', although I like the line. Additionally, the last stanza seems anticlimactic. Perhaps end it with your penultimate one. Otherwise this is as smooth as always. Cheers/Chris

[Brownlie]

Brownlie, you got an eek out of me. I hate mieces-to-pieces. I thought the poem may have stalled on 'My couching scent...', although I like the line. Additionally, the last stanza seems anticlimactic. Perhaps end it with your penultimate one. Otherwise this is as smooth as always. Cheers/Chris

Thanks for reading and commenting.

[StandingAlone]

I cringed when i read this because of my hatred for rats

[Brownlie]

I cringed when i read this because of my hatred for rats

Thanks for reading.

[Erthona]

Brownlie,

I think this would read better in present tense, for more eek effect As:

I wake at night
and hear them in the walls
I seek a corpse to pin them to
so I can lift this ghastly pall.

Maybe some punctuation would be beneficial. Plus I have no idea what it is you are attempting to say. Do you mean you hear the "squeak" of ghost mice, and you think that somehow if you find a mouse skeleton you will be able to attach it to them and thus eradicate them? Sorry, but this is to confusing to make sense of for me. Maybe I'm just dense, but you need to tell me more before I get what you are trying to say.


Beasties,


Dale

[Mopkins]

Hi Brownlie,

this seems unfinished - what is the character going to do now with this shrouded rat carcass? How does this corpse lift the ghastly pall? Is this moth eaten sheet significant? I was left wanting more. Perhaps some kind of ritual with the rat corpse to drive away the ghostly squeaking? My uncle used to nail crow corpses to the trees to scare away the crows from his garden - perhaps you had something like that in mind? I dunno - just seems that you could expand on this to me. I liked what you've got so far tho... Marianne

[Brownlie]

Thanks for the suggestions they're all very helpful. It was originally in present tense and then I changed it and never finished it. Some good stuff to think about here I really appreciate it.