It's the third Thursday of the month so I'd like to welcome you to A Gathering of Poetry. After the debate, I had a discussion with my neighbor and said I would be on tenterhooks until after Election Day. He looked at me quizzically, asked what tenterhooks were, and said he thought the word was "tender hooks". He's an educated man, so I thought he might be right and came in to look it up myself. During my search I came across this poem and it was too good not to share.
by Brian Bilston
Let me cut to the cheese:
every time you open your mouth,
I’m on tender hooks.
You charge at the English language
like a bowl in a china shop.
Please nip it in the butt.
On the spurt of the moment,
the phrases tumble out.
It’s time you gave up the goat.
Curve your enthusiasm.
Don’t give them free range.
The chickens will come home to roast.
Now you are in high dungeon.
You think me a damp squid:
on your phrases I shouldn’t impose.
But they spread like wildflowers
in a doggy-dog world,
and your spear of influence grows.
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Bilston, Brian. “On Tender Hooks a Poem by Brian Bilston.” Pan Macmillan, www.panmacmillan.com/blogs/literary/brian-bilston-friday-poem-on-tender-hooks. Accessed 12 Sept. 2024.
You can read more about the poet here.
(The photo at the top is a bowl in a china shop in case you were wondering.)
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Thank you for reading and joining us for our monthly Gathering of Poetry. You are more than welcome to add your link below if you would like to share one of your favorite poems. The more the merrier!
This is hilarious! I remember a commercial several years ago (what it was advertising, I don't know) in which a man was telling off a coworker for misusing sayings like this -- "They're fringe benefits, not French benefits!"
ReplyDeleteI am dying of laughter! This very much reminds me of the stint I had teaching ESL, and the confusion over idioms... which brought about the comment about being out in "the other field" and when I explained it was actually "out in left field" and the person happily responded, "oh... left or right, it does not matter!" This is poetic perfection! Thank you so much for sharing!
ReplyDeleteI can't tell you how many times I have to check to see if a word or a phrase I want to use in a comment or a post is correct. I am second guessing myself all the time.
ReplyDeleteBut sometimes the incorrect one is funnier and more entertaining!
DeleteHysterical! I love this. It makes me think of so many examples of folks saying the wrong thing...close but not quite there (though I had not heard of French benefits as Sarah mentioned - that's a good one too).
ReplyDeleteOhmygoodness! I just love this. And wait til I share it with Tom! This is SO right up his alley.
ReplyDeleteThat poem made me smile and laugh. You could probably do an entire post just asking everyone their experiences with inaccurate use of words and idioms. In my family, it was always song lyrics that were always incorrectly interpreted, some of them NSFW. And now you know you were right - tenterhooks!
ReplyDeleteLoved that one. The bowl is quite pretty too.
ReplyDeleteoh Bonny, this one is priceless ... and fun! I need to grow my spear :-)
ReplyDeletelove the doggy-dog world :) lol!
ReplyDeleteHow fun. This poem makes me smile.
ReplyDeleteMy all time favorite was a neighbor talking to my mom about selling their house and getting a good price and 'that was some constellation.' My mother could hardly keep from laughing. Another one she was in a romance novel...got past the editor..."The blood was cursing through his veins." My mother envisioned "Goddamn it, goddamn it..." :)
ReplyDeleteThese are good ones!
DeleteThis is such a great poem, I love it!
ReplyDelete