Poem
John McCullough
THE AMAZING TINTIN
THE AMAZING TINTIN
THE AMAZING TINTIN
sucks ice cubes at a bar, gazes out to sea.Tintin without Haddock who he left
with a question mark hanging beside his beard.
Tintin in his blue sweater, who wants to help
sad skinheads but gets asked to the sauna.
Snowy’s run away. The boy’s forgotten
how Calculus wandered off. He’s growing
stubble and his wet hair won’t lift
for the next frame. Where are
the frames anyway? Where, when people collide,
are the coloured stars, the ragged
RRRING of the telephone?
He spits ice in the glass. He can smell
adventures out there: smugglers doubling
as drag queens, treasure under the old pier
but he’s stopped too long. He’s lost
the maps and tonight for one last time Haddock,
cranky, devoted Haddock, will drink
himself to sleep aboard his ship.
© 2008, John McCullough
From: the lives of ghosts
Publisher: tall-lighthouse, London
From: the lives of ghosts
Publisher: tall-lighthouse, London
John McCullough
(United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 1978)
John McCullough was born in Watford in 1978 and grew up there during the eighties and nineties. He studied English and Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia before completing an MA in Sexual Dissidence at the University of Sussex, followed by a PhD on Shakespeare and friendship. He still teaches creative writing there now, in addition to similar work at the Open University. His ...
Poems
Poems of John McCullough
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THE AMAZING TINTIN
sucks ice cubes at a bar, gazes out to sea.Tintin without Haddock who he left
with a question mark hanging beside his beard.
Tintin in his blue sweater, who wants to help
sad skinheads but gets asked to the sauna.
Snowy’s run away. The boy’s forgotten
how Calculus wandered off. He’s growing
stubble and his wet hair won’t lift
for the next frame. Where are
the frames anyway? Where, when people collide,
are the coloured stars, the ragged
RRRING of the telephone?
He spits ice in the glass. He can smell
adventures out there: smugglers doubling
as drag queens, treasure under the old pier
but he’s stopped too long. He’s lost
the maps and tonight for one last time Haddock,
cranky, devoted Haddock, will drink
himself to sleep aboard his ship.
From: the lives of ghosts
THE AMAZING TINTIN
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