Jim Carruth
Old Whiskey Breath
Old Whiskey Breath
picks up his battered Gibson
and strums and scribbles
words and rhythm,
sneaks a glance
at an old black and white
framed on his bed-side cabinet,
and picks out the back of his head
three rows behind Willie Nelson.
This was the pinnacle,
way down the bill,
a last minute replacement
for the replacement
of the support
for the main man.
Later he would capture the moment
poignantly with the lyrics
in the great flu epidemic of 73
they tried everyone else and then there was me.
Since then the fall from grace,
comeback gigs-
bar mitzvahs and weddings-
have passed
largely unnoticed.
Still he searches for
a classic riff.
one song that they will remember him by.
Beside him
the dialysis machine
provides backing
since the last kidney
went solo.
Page(s) 54-55
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The